The New Thing
by Oliver2016
Summary: Megamind has gone missing! Nobody's seen him for weeks and Minion isn't the only one starting to worry about ghosts from their past! This is turning out SO much darker than I expected it to be! Rated T for later chapters and some will surely be M and I sort of want to add 'horror' too, but the system won't let me...
1. The New Thing

**Yeah, so, really new at this, have never written an FF before and _certainly_ not published! So, please be nice to me? If anyone thinks the rating or categories are wrong, let me know and I'll change them. I have no clue where the line is drawn between the things. So, here goes. Just a kind of teaser or something, next chapters I hope will be longer. Hope you like it.**

 **Not getting kidnapped is boring!**

The first week she didn't get kidnapped by the little blue maniac she was very happy.

The first three days were normal, since he rarely gave her any less than that between kidnappings, but the rest of the week was bliss!

He was apparently working on one of his bigger schemes. The fact that she hadn't gotten a clue didn't bother her too much. Now she finally had the free time to do all the stuff that usually got interrupted by his plots!

She got to do a thorough cleaning and dust bunny-hunt of her apartment. Then she sorted through her (massive) heap of clothes, both summer and winter, to decide what to give to goodwill, what to throw away and what to keep (ending up with three bags to give away and one to toss). Trying on everything before deciding took time!

Usually she wouldn't bother starting a project that could easily take three uninterrupted evenings to finish, but for some reason she felt confident this week that he wouldn't show up, or at least would wait until the end of the week.

She also got to hang out with friends at coffee shops (and actually stay until the end instead of getting kidnapped when taking a bathroom break or going for refill), go shopping and she even got a quiet night at home with a glass of wine and a good movie.

Normal life was great!

She also got to arrive at work on time the entire week. And stay for a full day all week! And no kidnappings even meant she didn't have to bring work home with her to finish in the evenings, so she had spare time to do a little pampering too!

* * *

The second week she was high-strung as hell, jumped at every little sound that just might have been a cape-swish or a robotic gorilla arm or a flying brainbot.

She just couldn't relax, always expecting the blue menace to jump out around every corner, closet, door, window... Or come exploding through a wall to get her 'critical participation' in the latest Evil plot.

She double and triple-checked every door and window (not that any lock had ever kept him out, but you know, stranger things have probably happened somewhere, sometime, during the history of mankind… or Earth...) but she still couldn't relax or get a good night's sleep, resulting in a very short-tempered Roxanne.

Hal got the brunt of her snaps, but she didn't even have the energy to feel bad about it.

Friday the second week was by far the worst. She was certain he would come for her today, since he very rarely did anything in the weekends.

If this was a courtesy to her to give her an actual weekend or if it was because of Minion she didn't know, but she liked it. But this weekend she wasn't so sure since he'd given her a whole two weeks off…

Maybe it was one of the rare occasions he predicted the whole ordeal to take days! Oh god she hoped not!

Megamind almost never went two weeks without kidnapping her, so he _ha_ _d_ to come this weekend!

Well, he didn't, except for a couple of weeks around Christmas or if he was working on something bigger than usual (like she suspected this time).

When she asked him about it around Christmas every year (it had almost become a weird kind of tradition by now) when he monologued about 'evil never taking a break' he mentioned that 'evil never rests but Minion wanted to go to 'insert location' and he really is a fantastic fish so he deserves it'.

But this wasn't the right time of year for the 'Minion wanted to go'-vacation, so that didn't explain the absent kidnappings.

It was most likely one of the times he was planning something huge, but she normally got a clue or ten the preceding kidnapping since one or both of them couldn't keep from hinting or straight out telling her.

If Minion was the one to spill the beans Megamind would scold him and threaten him with 'the frying pan' (if it was for hitting or cooking she didn't know).

If it was Megamind himself who couldn't keep his mouth shut Minion would again get a scolding (for not stopping him) but no threat of the frying pan.

If he was particularly proud of the plan he would almost blurt it out as soon as the bag was pulled off her head, and she would promptly laugh or come with some snide remark about how all his plans always failed and this wouldn't be any different.

And also, Megamind would never plan a disappearance and not inform Metroman... Well, he probably _would_ , just to keep the hero guessing and on his toes, but not telling her?! That was just rude, and Megamind may be many things, but rude was not one of them.

Except if he was talking to, doing something to or just in general interacting somehow with anyone else than her... Then he was the expert on 'rude and sarcastic' and never let anyone forget.

But even if _he_ forgot to tell her, Minion wouldn't. So where was he? She was tired of waiting (what?) and going around just waiting for the spray to go off in her face made her grumpy, annoyed and downright unpleasant to be around.

She just wanted to get it over with! Yes, that's why. To just be finished with it. Certainly not because she- Nope, just to get it over with!

So they could start the whole cycle all over again next week... oh, what fun...

* * *

The third week she actually caught herself worrying a bit. Had something happened? He wasn't in jail, that's for sure, since he'd escaped even before they even put him in the police cruiser.

And there were no rumors about sightings of either Megamind or Minion.

Brainbot-spotting (a thriving hobby among enthusiasts) had drastically declined the past two weeks to nearly zero, and the few spotted were acting… strange.

She discreetly hinted to Wayne if he had seen or heard anything, but he was busy enjoying the 'downtime' he so rarely got that he hadn't even thought to look for them.

Some hero...

She even took a trip or two down to the industrial district just in case. That was as close as she was to knowing where the lair was.

The times she got a glimpse outside during plots they almost always were in the industrial lakeshore area. But no luck...

Where had he gone? It wasn't as if she _cared_ about him. Sure, she didn't want him dead, but actually _care_? No, no way.

But what if something had happened to Minion? Maybe _he_ was the one who was hurt!

She _liked_ Minion! He may be an "evil" henchfish, but he always made sure she was as comfortable she could be during kidnappings.

And Roxanne also knew that with the relationship those two had Megamind would risk his own life to save the fish! Or run himself into the ground to find a way to help his friend.

What would Megamind do if Minion was gone? She had seen how close they were when they thought she was unconscious and that one time when Minion almost got killed in a blast.

Megamind had been completely frantic until he dug Minion out of the rubble. Then he'd just jumped on the jetbike with Minion in his arm and left her for Metroman to come pick up (but he'd said sorry about "his rude departure" during the next kidnapping).

She rarely saw such close relationships even among family members, and that forehead-touch-thing...

They had the kind of close bond she would have liked to have with her own family (was she jealous?).

And besides, they were aliens, and with his big head and Minion's little antenna-thing there was no telling what that could mean. They could actually have a telepathic link or something. Or they could be some sort of symbiots, co-dependent on each other to live. Or... something else entirely...

She had no idea, and it didn't help her worrying at all! What if one of them had caused the other one injury? Or death?!

The one left would probably be a mental wreck. Maybe even suicidal... How would anyone even know if one or both of them died?

No-one knew where the lair was, and it wasn't like anyone would miss them from a book club or... sewing club... or something.

They would just sort of stop the evil plots and after some time people would get used to it and never think about them again.

Of course, if it was Minion, if he was dead and the cause was something from the city, a person, a building or anything like that, she was certain Megamind would go completely off the hook and exact a 'rehvange' of epic proportions if he could.

They would be lucky if there were a Metro City left standing. But if the situation was reversed she wasn't sure what Minion would do...

He seemed like such a gentle soul she couldn't imagine him raining destruction down on the city. He'd probably just fade away, move somewhere else (if he even lived) and do… un-evil things...

Somehow she had to find them. And when she did she hoped it would end up with her tied to a chair as usual. Not that she _wanted_ to get kidnapped, but that would mean everything was back to normal, and right now she needed normal!

The normalicy of getting kidnapped once a week...


	2. Lairs are apparently hard to find

**Something keeps going wrong with the upload...**

 **And I gu** **ess I should warn you, this will get sort of dark and bloody... M-rating kind of bloody. You've been warned! Oh, and I love comments and constructive critics :-D**

After spending every free moment the last half of the third and the entire fourth kidnapping-free week looking for the lair, she had found Absolutely. Nothing!

She had been out at all times of the day (and night), in all kinds of weather (autumn by the great lakes meant you could get everything from summer heat to winter storms all within 24 hours) looking for the tiniest sign. She even took roundabout ways when going on reports and she volunteered for smaller assignments she wouldn't usually care about, just to maximize her time out in the city.

The thought that he might be planning something huge had struck her several times by now and was still the most likely cause of their absence, but something kept telling her that wasn't the case.

And they most definitely hadn't just packed their things and given up being the supervillainous duo. Come to think about it, Minion might, but not him. He was too stubborn for that. She just couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong. Terribly wrong!

She had tried spotting brainbots she could follow, the few that were left to be seen, but the few times she'd been lucky they had just given her the slip after guiding her around town. Every. Single. Time. Hal had actually started asking questions, and if he could sense something was amiss, then anyone could! She just had to be more careful in her search.

She tried being subtle when they spotted brainbots, 'suggesting' they follow it, but when she finally had a lead like that, even when she knew it would be another wild goose (bot?)-chase, she couldn't keep herself from yelling "follow that bot!" like it was a car-chase in a cheesy action-movie. Even her boss, who was more or less oblivious to what cases she did apart from the ones he assigned her, raised an eyebrow when he saw her covering the record attempt on "tallest human tower of smurfs" in the city square (they broke it by two feet).

Today she was covering something more her style; it was the Mayor giving a speech before opening the new library, funded by donations from charity events and other donations collected before and during construction, in addition to the usual government funding.

It was the usual long-winded 'thank you to all who have helped with this project, this is truly a public library, yada, yada, yada...' and everyone knew the Scotts had probably funded well over 90 % of the costs apart from the government's portion. There was just no way the politicians would fund enough to build this!

It was huge, with stone walls, pillars, arched windows and two huge lions on each side of the giant steps outside, complete with environmentally friendly versions of leaded glass and carvings and a sort of Gothic feel to it. It was an unusual project for them to fund, but she assumed Wayne had pushed for it, being the "hero" and all and needing the family to support something publicly beneficial every once in a while.

Besides, he appeared to enjoy the old library more than she would have expected, so he probably wanted to "update" it for his own pleasure too.

The Mayor went on and on about all the fantastic opportunities the city would receive from the building of this library, as if a new library was cause for a presidential appearance or maybe a royal visit (if you didn't count the Scotts, they behaved like royalty and were already on the podium).

She knew it would become just like the old one, unfortunately. In a while people would loose interest since they had all information found in a library (and more) at their fingertips as long as they had a computer.

They would flock to it right after the opening, everyone talking about how they would start using it more and donate, but visiting numbers would soon dwindle in a few weeks. Then the funding would dry up, the books would become outdated and replacing them would take time, and just like that they'd be back at square one.

Not that she didn't like libraries. She was one of the few who went there regularly. There was just something about holding a book between her fingers instead of staring at a computer screen. She liked the smell of them, and the quiet in the old library had been a one of a kind in Metro City.

Built with thick walls the city noise was kept out and the temperature both summer and winter was stable and pleasant. She often escaped there after a rough work day or just to sit quietly and read a good book.

It would be at least a month until the new one got that same atmosphere of quiet familiarity, probably several months, and she hoped they had invested in good furniture too, none of those modern, clean-cut angles that was so hot right now. Granted, they looked good, but they were horrible to sit in unless you wanted to feel like a pretzel when finally finding a comfy position. She preferred thick cushions she could sink into, almost making a nest if she found a blanket and almost get eaten by the sofa.

Huh, sofas trying to eat people… why hadn't Megamind ever thought of that? That sounded like just the kind of Eeevil plan he would think up!

The applause brought her out of her daydream just in time for her to sign off and give the cut-sign to Hal.

\- All right Roxaroo, that's done and done!

Hal turned off the camera and put the heavy thing in the van.

\- So, we're both off the rest of the day and you've been so busy lately! What do you say we go for a burger and then back to my place? I got a buddy in the gaming industry and he got me this new game, it's killer, I promise, and it's not even on the marked yet, so it's really hush-hush, it'll be our little secret, right? Oh, and it's got two-player and everything! Or we could just hang and relax, I could give you a foot rub or maybe a back massage...

She had to concentrate to not obviously shiver from his suggestion of a massage. Hal seriously couldn't take 'no' for an answer. He apparently was one of those guys who heard 'keep trying' when a woman said 'no'.

She'd worked with him for two years, quite long for a cameraman with his talents, turned him down every single time he asked and still he didn't give up!

Anyone else with his gifts would have already been headhunted for one of the larger channels or even the international ones. But who's to say he hadn't had offers? He'd never mentioned it, and she was sure he would tell everyone who'd listen if he did, just to show off but you never knew. She had a strong suspicion he stayed at Channel 8 because of her. He had an unhealthy fixation on her, she knew, but she felt kind of guilty if she was the one who kept him from being recognized as a great filmmaker. She knew that was stupid, he was a grown man capable of making his own decisions, but still...

Hal kept blabbering while they put away the rest of the equipment and Roxanne got her purse from the van, but she didn't really hear him. She was too busy wringing her brain for a new idea of how to find Megamind and Minion.

-No thanks, Hal. I have a lot of work to do yet, and I need to… wash my hair when I get home tonight.

 _Wash my hair? I'm seriously running out of excuses if I'm resorting to that!_

But he came on to her several times a day! What else could she do? Last month she had made an excuse involving crab people, for god's sake! She didn't have the heart to tell him how she would rather jump into Megamind's alligator pit than go on a date with him. The fact that the 'evil' genius would jump right in after her had nothing to do with it. What so ever. Ever!

\- Oh. Well, how about tomorrow? It's Friday, they have a weekend offer over at KFC's, all you can eat buffet for just twenty bucks!

Hal was almost jumping in anticipation.

\- With all the extra running around we've done the last week we both deserve something good! My treat! And then we could go back to your place, or mine! And just kick it!

 _Oh good lord. No means NO, Hal! Get that into your dense brain and take a god damn hint!_

Was what she wanted to tell him...

\- Sorry, have plans tomorrow. See you Monday.

And then she ran. Well, walked, as fast as she could into the crowd, just in case he decided to follow. She dodged around hot-dog carts, a balloon-man and went through every cluster of people she could see. She even stepped on a few toes, but called a hurried 'sorry' before she was gone again. A few turns later and she was sure Hal couldn't find her. That was confirmed when she saw the news van speed by a couple seconds later with an annoyed-looking Hal behind the wheel, luckily without him seeing her.

As soon as the threat of Hal was gone her mind went back to Megamind and Minion. Today marked the 28th kidnapping-free day. A whole month. Four weeks. And no sign of either of them. Perhaps she _should_ enlist Wayne.

Metro Man she reminded herself. He was always so picky that she called him Wayne when he was off duty and always Metro Man on duty. Fair enough, but then why couldn't he remember she wanted to be called Roxanne? Not Roxie, Rox, Rox-Fox, Roxaroo (thank god only Hal used that one) or any of the other stupid shortenings of her name.

She _liked_ her name, her _whole_ name, fucking use it! Maybe Wayne/Metro Man would get it into his thick skull sometime next century. Or maybe Megamind could invent some sort of hammer to pound it into his head!

An image of a huge hammer on an even bigger bot holding Metro Man in one hand and pounding him with the other, Megamind on the bot's head shouting "it's Roxanne, her name is Roxanne you imbecile!" suddenly materialized in her head, and she couldn't stop laughing. People gave her some funny looks but she didn't really care. She was even sure he'd do it if she asked!

When she was sure Hal was long gone she started drifting out of the center of town and down towards the industrial district.

It was so frustrating that she "knew" where the lair was, but couldn't find it! And it was hopeless to just wander about the city hoping she would stumble upon the lair by chance. With a huge amount of luck she might catch a glimpse of one of them, but then she would need to follow them too, and this was Megamind she was looking for! The guy who could practically walk out of maximum security prison whenever he wanted and avoid getting caught by the entire police force. She didn't have a chance following him unless he wanted her to find him!

And he didn't.

The opening of the library was a big enough deal for her to expect Megamind to have a decent scheme going, and she had been exposed more than long enough to be kidnapped by now. He should come in a giant robot prepared with bad puns based on books and libraries and everything! Why the hell was he a no-show?!

What if this was just a break from their routine and she worked herself up for nothing? No-one said the way it had been between the four of them the last six years was set in stone.

Anyone could get tired and want some change. Could they have... retired? Just- 'You know what? I'm sick of this, let's go buy an island in the Caribbean and go live there. We can be evil islanders somewhere warm'. Technically it was possible… But no, unlikely.

Still, she'd rather that happened than one of the more horrible reasons for disappearing she'd thought of the last couple of weeks. Or they could have decided to just take a vacation. Even supervillains could get burnt out...

No, she was sure something unplanned had happened. Maybe he'd built something and it had blown up and seriously injured him? Not unlikely, his stuff blew up all the time, but there had been no reports of explosions or noises or disturbances, so she classified that scenario as unlikely. Wayne wouldn't have missed something that big, and he would have told her, both to give her a chance to cover it and to let her know she would be unlikely to be kidnapped anytime soon.

 _Urrrrh, I just have to keep looking. Sooner or later she was bound to get lucky, right?_

She just hoped it wouldn't be too late. Too late for what? She stopped and blinked at that thought.

She had a few contacts on the darker side of the law she could check out. They were old ones, it was several years since she'd had to use them, but they would remember her, she was sure. Including what they owed her. Even if they didn't know where the troublesome duo was maybe they could help her narrow down the area of where she thought the lair was.

One of her extremely few clues (one out of two, actually) to the lair's location were the smell and occasional glimpses outside during kidnappings. The entire industrial area by the shore had this unmistakable smell of oil, rotting seaweed and a whiff of fish. Sort of like the detested bag they always used on her. Except on her birthday. They probably kept it in a box with old seaweed and dirty socks, thinking it 'more evil', no matter how many times she asked Minion to wash it, or offered to wash it herself.

She kept wandering for a good three hours, going by places she'd been kidnapped from before, taking care to stand longer in open areas to give Minion a chance to come in the invisible car, but no luck. Not a rumble from an unseen car, not a fizz from a spray can and not a whiff of rotting seaweed whatsoever. She could only hope she'd get a lead later after talking to her informants in Metro City's underworld.

* * *

Her contacts was a bust. The only information they had were things she already knew, like the fact that the lair was in the industrial district.

What worried her the most was that nobody had seen hide nor hair of Megamind since the last televised kidnapping (not that he had a lot of hair to be seen), and just a few had been visited by Minion for the usual 'collections', while the rest had gotten snapping brainbots visiting. Not unusual, Megamind rarely did the collections himself, but he tagged along sometimes.

After meeting with her last contact, excusing her interest with a 'rumor' she wanted to confirm with the villain and it not being practical when she was being kidnapped (thank god Eddie didn't ask what rumor), she headed home for some dinner and hoped she would have time for a drive down to the suspected lair-area again later tonight.

* * *

Dinner consisted of a frozen pie with fries on the side (nice and healthy, fries were potatoes, a vegetable, and there were broccoli-pieces in the pie, four of them). She changed into more comfortable clothes; washed-out jeans, a light blue sweater with a high neck and the black leather jacket with the silver buckles. She would be driving her own car tonight!

She was out the door again within the hour and headed to the underground parking garage instead of passing by Carlos through the main door. Waiting in the elevator she briefly wondered again why the hell she was doing this.

The last kidnapping had been so weird and she thought Megamind had really insulted her. But after thinking about it after getting "rescued" by Way- Metro Man, she decided he had insulted the intelligence of the entire city _except_ her's. He'd said so too, only in a very convoluted, beat-around-the-bush, Megamind-ish way that took her forever to figure out. So when he didn't kidnap her the first week she kind of thought it was his way of saying 'sorry' or he was too embarrassed to try again so soon. Guess not...

Her car was dusty. Shit, she'd forgotten to put the cover on last time she parked and she hoped the battery wasn't dead too. It wasn't the best any more. She meant to change it for one of those expensive ones that handled low temperatures much better, but she never got around to do it.

She rarely drove her own car since she always took the van to work, Hal insisting it was no trouble coming halfway across the city to pick her up in the mornings. She'd told him he didn't have to do it so many times now she had given up. She also did most of her shopping to and from work, and living as central as she did most of the shops she needed was within walking distance.

But sometimes she just felt a bit on the wild side and would take a trip just for the drive. Especially out of town on the more deserted parts of the highways where she could run on the border of redlining. It was always a thrill!

She often did it after a particularly tense kidnapping or if she got fed up by something at work, most often Hal, and had to get out some steam. The speed cleared her mind and she felt so relaxed after a drive like that!

It also helped that the car was a'67 Mustang Fastback, black and usually sporting a shiny finish with chrome details, and the interior was a dark midnight blue with lighter blue accents. It was simply a work of art now.

She'd bought it on impulse, getting a bargain. Her father had helped her spiff it up and tuned the engine, being ecstatic his daughter had inherited his taste in cars. But even having a car like that and racing like she did on deserted highways she was no racer in city traffic. Too easy to get a ticket, and they were expensive!

She kept to the speed limits and didn't miss a single stop-sign on her way down to the industrial district, but she did get a few looks when passing pedestrians.

Not many people knew this side of the quite famous reporter, and seeing her looking like some kind of street racer was a surprise to a lot of them.

Up until recently she had avoided people recognizing her, but she had been told to remove the tint on the front side windows or the car would be impounded until she did. Oh well, not much to do about it, it wasn't like she'd sell it, so she had done what they told her, and so what if people saw her? It was a nice car and she was proud of it!

A nice, black and blue car…

Fuck that, she was out searching for Megamind of all people! And Minion. She would drive whatever she wanted and people who had anything to say could go shove it!

She cruised along, passing abandoned buildings covered in graffiti and with every single window broken.

How the hell would she find them? There was no way the brainbots would enter the lair while being observed. She didn't know how but they were intelligent. And it was getting dark now, she would have to call it a day soon, this neighborhood wasn't exactly safe… she just wanted to check out one last street before turning back.

She ended up breaking and entering a few places (just a few) after deciding just looking from the outside would be as effective as trying to power a jumbo jet with gummybears.

Okay, she technically broke into every single abandoned building she found in that last street, each time hoping that '-this! This is the lair!' But, no such luck.

Everything was empty and looked like it hadn't been used in years. But, someone still owned them even if they were abandoned, so it was still a crime. That she committed. While trying to find her own, personal kidnapper.

Yeeeeah, totally normal...

 _Nope, this isn't anywhere near the realm of 'normal'._

In fact she suspected it was on the completely opposite end of the string ranging from normal to not normal, maybe even in a completely other dimension than 'normal'.

Wanting to be kidnapped and go looking for one's kidnapper when he or his sidekick failed to show up. Loosing sleep at night wondering where they are and worrying if he's still in one piece… Worrying!

Damn it, she should be dancing in the streets celebrating her kidnapping days seemed to be over! Not- this!

And the problem was, if she told anyone they would scream 'Stockholm Syndrome' before she finished the first sentence and demand she see a psychiatrist. Or they'd just put her in a padded room for fear of her being a danger to society. At the very least a 'bad influence' on the children.

That meant she couldn't too openly ask around without tipping people off. Not her friends anyway. Or co-workers. She could always say she wanted to get an interview but then why hadn't she asked about it during a kidnapping ages ago? The 'rumor'-thing she used with her underworld contacts probably wouldn't work with anyone else, not unless she would want them to think she was kind of 'in on' the whole damsel-thing.

She knew just enough of Megamind's operation to make it appear she knew, but if that came out to her more law-abiding acquaintances she'd be picked up by the police in an instance for interrogation. And besides, people weren't stupid. Well, not as stupid as Megamind seemed to think they were. Not all of them anyway. Her asking about him, claiming she wanted an interview or whatever, just when he stopped kidnapping her? Most people would see right through it...

It also seemed that the prevailing opinion around town was 'he's dead', 'he left' or 'he gave up' and everyone was just happy he was gone, not caring where or why or how. The one she really hated hearing was 'the government finally got him'. Because what if they did? And they said 'finally' like it was a _good_ thing!

Since when had he been an threat? He played a game with another alien, sure, breaking buildings and being a pain in the ass with the whole thing, but he had never hurt anyone (she'd checked, he had never even been accused of accidentally hurting anyone) and he never ever hurt his long-time kidnapping victim either!

This was hopeless! She never got a look when Metro Man rescued her since he always kept a hand over her eyes while leaving the lair or wherever Megamind had decided to stage everything.

When she asked about it he'd told her he knew 'how nosy you are, can't have you go snooping around in there getting munched on by brainbots or eaten by the gators'.

She had told him exactly what she thought about him 'protecting' her like that (in very clear terms) and that it was her right to 'be munched by brainbots or eaten by 'gators' if she so chose, and that it was not his job to intervene unless she called for him. Besides, Megamind was basically harmless.

\- He wouldn't hurt a fly

She'd told him that. Literally, he wouldn't. She had seen him once, ordering one of the brainbots to 'catch it but don't hurt it. Just put it outside'.

It had been buzzing around that large head of his for the last half hour of a kidnapping when they ended up having to wait for Metro Man (like a little moon, she'd thought, going around a planet, and couldn't stop giggling at the image in her head).

"Annoying little creature" he'd said when she had raised an inquiring eyebrow at him.

She had continued to stare at him in bemusement until he got uncomfortable and pretended to do something very important over by the blinky dials. In other words: harmless! And sometimes unpredictable. And how the hell he came off as 'evil' to anyone she would never know…

* * *

While impossible for Roxanne to know, over twenty eyes were following her from outside Evil Lair. They knew how to stay hidden, but two of their brothers ventured too close and were almost caught a few times. The others had made sure to tell them not to do it again, no matter if Daddy had upgraded them with invisibility.

But they weren't jealous.

Of course not.

In addition one pair followed her on surveillance monitors with the feed coming from across the street.

The eyes narrowed, wondering what the reporter was doing there. This was the third time he'd seen her this close to Evil Lair and he was starting to get worried. She was obviously looking for something and he had a suspicion what that might be. Should he contact her...?

* * *

Day 29, after another fruitless drive around town during working hours, her excuse to Hal being the 'need for some background shots', and turning down a rather insistent invitation for a 'girl's night out, come on, what do you do all night anyway, it's been ages!' from Janie at work, she found herself (again) in the industrial district.

She'd been in this specific area several times before, including yesterday, and found nothing, but something in her gut said that this had to be the right general area. Gods knew she'd been driven to the lair plenty of times, but even unconscious she thought her body would probably have gotten some kind of feel for where she were.

At least that's what she gambled on today. And sometimes when she had been here she had felt… observed. Someone watching her, and it had made her skin crawl. She just needed to look closer.

When she finally found the entrance to the lair she had circled the building three times just today, tried to climb the walls in four places and then gone to lean against a shaded wall for a quick break and to check her cell, only to find herself flat on her back inside.

She quickly got back on her feet and stepped through the wall again, not quite believing what just happened, looking closely at it from the outside.

It was designed to look like an old brick wall tagged with "no-one lives here, we promise, go away" with sky-blue paint. The picture was almost perfect, even down to little bits of lichen growing in the cracks and pieces of cement missing.

How had she possibly overlooked that graffiti before?! She had passed this building several times. Come on, who but Megamind would write something like that?

And now that she thought about it it was a bit strange she hadn't registered the missing entrance in the wall, but it was probably because she hadn't actually circled it before, just passed it on one or two sides, always thinking 'the door must be on the other side'.

It was a relatively open area around the building, with a view to the lake some distance away and the noise from the city was quite low out here.

It had been a power plant before, judging by the transformers and thick power-lines and towers in one end of the lot. The building itself was mostly brick and huge! The wall surrounding the building must be at least twelve-fifteen feet high and the building dwarfed the wall!

She quickly went inside again, before the wall could go solid again or something. This was Megamind's door, and she could have just been lucky it was open right when she leaned against it. Who knew if it even remained in the same place all the time?

Looking around after getting inside again, she truly realized where she was and all she could think was

\- Wow...

She had been planning on taking as many pictures as possible before getting caught by the brainbots (luckily her camera had been around her neck and been saved by her abdomen from breaking on the hard concrete floor when she fell through the wall), but the little bots never came.

She still didn't get any pictures though, seeing as she was too awed by the sight that greeted her beyond the not-an-actual-wall-door.

She kind of, sort of got distracted by the realization she was inside the lair, okay?

A huge, long room with shelves upon shelves filled with anything and everything, ranging from gutted toasters to things whose name and purpose she couldn't even begin to imagine. The ceiling was so high she couldn't even see it in the semi-darkness of the massive space. It was obviously a storage area for both supplies and inventions, and judging by the tire tracks and burnt rubber on the floor also where they parked the car.

She couldn't see it, but it was an _invisible_ car and maybe they had forgotten to turn it off.

In a corner there was something that looked like a partially dismantled motorcycle, but she didn't see anywhere the tires would go. But the front of it looked like… a jet engine?

Had he designed a jet-powered motorcycle?

There were even large things hanging from chains in the ceiling to keep them out of the way. Was that a mechanical shark?

Old machinery from when the building was operational could be seen in between all the inventions and home-made shelves. At least the parts that were too large to remove, like the old turbines.

She wandered around that one, long room for what seemed like ages, just looking at things. She didn't touch anything though. You never knew what was a booby trap or when a washing machine would wake up and try to eat you.

Almost everything had spikes on it, too. And the low light fed into the eerie feeling that this place could actually hurt you. Just like Megamind tried to convey every time she saw him. Did the villain really live like this? Dark and damp and spiky and uncomfortable? She hoped not...

She noticed that everything was covered in dust. Not a lot, but more than she would expect when Minion was around. A more dedicated house-ape-fish would be hard to come by, even if he wasn't the last of his kind.

Even during her kidnappings she had caught him a few times with a dusting rag. Usually just before Megamind gave him a glare or grumbled to him about 'evil don't care about dust. Just stand in the corner and try to look menacing!'

She sneaked around, looking into every room she found along the way, always expecting a brainbot or some other mechanical contraption to jump at her. Most of them were just more storage rooms and one seemed to contain shelves upon shelves of dead or sleeping brainbots. How many bots did he have? There had to be thousands of them!

After an hour she came upon a huge room that the entrance-storage-room opened up into. It felt like sort of a 'main hub' with rooms and corridors going off in different directions.

Directly opposite where she came from was a huge, red curtain (probably stolen from the theater) covering what she thought must be a large area of the main hub in the building.

 _Of course he would have his own theater_

she thought a little sarcastically, it wasn't like he could just drop in on a movie when he wanted. Well, he could, but then there would be police and Metro Man and he wouldn't get to see the whole movie and...

 _Heh, the chairs will probably have spikes and be equipped with deathtraps._

But what she found on the other side of the velvet curtain was nothing like she expected.

As opposed to the parts of the lair she had seen so far, which was damp, cold and feeling creepy, this room was warm and bright, devoid of anything that looked 'evil' (apart from what was on large blueprint sheets hanging- well, everywhere) and felt downright cozy.

There were pieces of paper hanging from a lower ceiling than on the other side of the curtain, and probably twenty tables with what looked like hundreds of drawings, diagrams, calculations and future inventions. She could even see some doodles! There was a very realistic smiling Minion in the corner of something that looked like a satellite (he had his own satellite in orbit?!) and one of Megamind himself, much less detailed, having apparently defeated Metro Man, standing on his chest in one of his silly, "victorious" poses and laughing. She couldn't help but smile at that one. A perpetual optimist, apparently.

She spent another half-hour just perusing all the designs, half-started inventions and countless doodles in the curtain-room.

The doodles were actually the most interesting, since she didn't really understand the diagrams other than the ones with a complete sketch of the "finished" invention. Over half of what she could see of the blueprints didn't seem 'evil' at all. At least the ones she had an idea of what were, since the apparent function wasn't 'evil', just incredible advanced and would probably have a huge impact on society if he ever decided to use his genius for good.

Some of the stuff was so far beyond anything currently in existence she wouldn't know what to even call it, and other designs had so many mathematical formulas attached to them she would need a doctorate to understand even the ten first symbols. And there wasn't a single spike on anything.

Along one wall she found eleven blackboards, all covered in math that appeared to be one single formula just continuing from one board to the next. Some symbols she recognized from math class in school but others appeared to be from another language, like Chinese or Cyrillic. Or maybe he had invented his own symbols for all she knew. And when she looked behind the boards the formula continued on the other side of five of the boards!

If she'd had any doubt he was a genius (she hadn't) it had been completely eradicated now, seeing this room. The man had clearly so much to give society with his intellect, so why the hell was he so intent on being a villain? It clearly wasn't for money, he hadn't robbed a bank in years and he could probably earn more selling inventions than he could steal in a lifetime of villainy.

She knew about his history after landing on Earth, growing up in prison (that couldn't possibly have been legal in any way), going 'bad' at a young age, but nothing more than anyone else.

Both the prison and the villain himself were very close-lipped about that subject. She hadn't even gotten a word out of Minion, and he was a blabbermouth like none other!

But he _was_ a different species than her, and maybe he was solitary? Like tigers? While humans were more like lions, thriving best with others of their species (just like sheep).

Maybe he just liked it better alone in his own little world, and his attempts on Metro Man were a sort of social interaction when he felt like it? It's not like any citizen would casually come up and chat with him. Maybe Metro Man was his only social interaction with anyone besides her and that was all he needed? Or maybe it was his way to just keep in shape, like when she went to the gym? An entertaining form of exercise? Because he was certainly in shape…

Wandering around aimlessly in the curtain-room didn't give her any more answers about either his life choices, his workout routine or his disappearance, so after a while she went back out to the main hub, camera still hanging forgotten around her neck.

So many hallways, so many doors. So many choices! And not a single brainbot in sight! Something else was missing too, but she couldn't put her finger on it… but it made the entire lair feel more creepy, especially now that she was back outside the cozy curtain-room.

She took a right after exiting the curtain-room and chose a large corridor that looked like it had a decline, but no actual steps, and suddenly she knew what was missing.

Sounds!

She was used to there always being some background noise during her kidnappings. The whirring of the bots, some clanging in the distance, buzzing from whatever deathtrap he used that day and an ever-present hum from something deep down. Probably from machines running deeper in the lair. And very often rock music...

But so far it had seemed actually abandoned! And those missing brainbots were really strange. Yes, there had been hundreds of them in those storage rooms, but they were off, or dead, or hibernating or something. Every single time she had been here there were brainbots and every time she managed to get loose of her ropes they were on her in an instant.

Always one in Megamind's lap when he turned around in his chair, thinking he looked ominous, saying his usual "Miss Ritchi, we meet again", and always some flying around the room actually doing things. This silent eeriness wasn't how it should be. There should be lots of noise, brainbots everywhere, some evil cackling and at least an attempt to catch her in the act of snooping!

Walking down the hallway she spied a Tesla-coil she thought looked familiar. It had a dent that looked like someone had hit it with a fist. Metro Man, she assumed. It had been placed in a corner a few months ago during one of her kidnappings. Megamind had offhandedly threatened her with electrocution since she hadn't been afraid of his 'man-eating wasps' but it hadn't even been plugged in. The plug had been lying right there on the floor...

She briefly wondered what Metro Man had been doing these past few weeks. They rarely talked outside of rescues so she had no clue what he did in his spare time. Perhaps she should ask him to help her look if she didn't find them here. He wasn't a friend as much as an acquaintance, but he was a hero, so helping to find someone was his job, even if it was his arch enemy and/or his sidekick who'd gone missing. She'd talk to him about it later if this didn't pan out.

A movement caught her eye, something slipping behind a corner further down the corridor she had entered. She ran after it, not sure if it was a brainbot or something more vicious, and peeked around the corner. You never knew what could be hiding in here.

Yes, definitely a brainbot, she could see the blue glow from a distance, and it hadn't spotted her yet!

The corridor it had gone down was surprisingly free of clutter so she wouldn't loose time having to step carefully over spiky inventions in the gloomy half-light. She stepped out to follow it but before she had taken three steps another one flew right past her, following the first one.

It slowed to a stop a few feet in front of her and turned to look at her. The electric sparks in it's 'head' grew stronger and she prepared to run, but it just looked at her with it's glowing red eye.

This one had three rows of spikes running over it's dome and some sharp-looking teeth in that bear-trap jaw. The little arms twitched as if it wanted to grab her but then relaxed again, just hanging loosely below the jaws.

Suddenly it made a growling bowg-ish sound, clanked it's jaws once and turned around to follow the first one.

When she remembered to let out her breath she'd been holding she started moving forward again, but slower and more carefully now.

She glanced up and was shocked. There were an endless line of brainbots floating along the high ceiling, going both ways and some branching off to get to a task it had. And not a single one seemed to notice her!

No, that wasn't quite true, every single bot took a look at her and then just kept going.

This didn't make any sense and that worried knot she'd had in her stomach the last few weeks suddenly tripled in size.

This was just wrong! They should be swarming her! Grabbing her with their tendrils and bringing her to Megamind who would cackle 'evilly', tie her to the chair and go taunt Metro Man! They never ignored her presence like this.

Normally Megamind had to chase them away from her if they didn't have a set task in the kidnappings (when they did they were surprisingly well behaved). And even then they sneaked back in to look at her, touch her arm or hair and once one had even settled on her lap before he noticed!

That had actually been fun. He had yelled at the little traitor-bot and tried to scare it away. The bot had obediently hovered away from her but then it had promptly bitten Megamind in the leg as payback.

The blue villain had limped around the rest of the evil plot, cursing his invention, calling it a dimwitted creation of science.

When she had inquired about what that would make him, seeing as he was the inventor of said creation, he started spluttering something indignant and turned quite purple.

He had been too busy to talk to her the rest of the plot...

But now the little bots weren't doing any of that. They took a look at her and continued on, wherever they were going. One of the lines was heading in the general direction of the exit (or so she thought), so she decided to follow the other line, heading deeper into the lair.

She had no idea what to expect, but she hadn't become a star reporter because she didn't take chances. All big scoops required some guts, and she had never been short on that.

The corridor itself was more like an alley between two buildings, considering the height of the ceiling.

It looked like Megamind had added walls and this "alleyway" was the just an accidental result.

Just bare concrete floor and brick walls about fifty feet long, mostly covered in plaster, some bare light-bulbs hanging from wires along the wall, all but one dead. At the other end there was a door. One of those double steel doors you would see in the basements of government buildings, only this one looked reinforced. She could see where the frame had been strengthened with girders and beams bolted or welded into place. It had been painted red once, but time and neglect had rendered it faded. It didn't look like it was in daily use either.

The second brainbot opened the door with some struggle and she could hear faint music coming from inside. Finally a sign of life in this place!

She headed for the end of the corridor and the door there, not knowing what she would find but hoping she at least would get an answer. Upon opening the door she saw he had his back turned to her, seeming to write something and nodding along to a song she guessed was coming from a radio. She gave a sigh of relief.

Finally!


	3. The Search Begins

**I know, I know, I'm sloooooooow… but I'm sort of an impulse-writer and write whatever drops into my mind and it takes forever to get enough for a chapter... Then there's the thing with putting it all together, details, making it flow reasonably well, etc, etc, etc… You know how it goes ;-)**

 **But! I WILL finish the** **story, you'll just have to be patient...**

 **Oh, and I don't own Megamind because my name isn't Dreamworks...**

* * *

His back was turned towards her, apparently staring at a huge bank of monitors, unconsciously nodding at a song coming from- _a brainbot?_

Because there _was_ a brainbot hovering there. At the far end of the blinky control panel. But instead of the usual spikes across it's dome there were dozens of small glowing orbs, all pulsing along with the music in different colors. They couldn't be more than an inch in diameter and seemed to be an opaque white when they weren't pulsing with sounds. It even appeared the bot itself was bobbing along with the music!

The monitors that had his complete attention were of all makes and models, from really old boxy ones (probably modern before she was born) to the sleekest, thinnest, new flat screens not even in the stores yet (at least she thought so, she'd never seen anything like them). There were probably over forty screens in the room, and every single one, as far as she could tell, showed a view of the city.

The room itself was actually quite large, she noted, but all the screens that was stuffed into it along with a control panel that spanned the entire length of the room (complete with blinky lights, levers and big red buttons) made it feel like a closet. The walls were concrete, just like the floor, but they were painted in an off-white color only broken by wires and power-cables running up to the ceiling.

She almost laughed out loud when she saw the little vase with a _blue_ daisy in it on the far end of the control panel.

 _How did they make it blue?_

The brainbots she had followed were hovering above each of his shoulders, also staring at the screens, their little arms occasionally twitching and making whirring, clicking sounds at him.

 _Are they giving a report? Are they telling him I'm here?_

No, even now they ignored her in favor of the screens and their boss.

On-screen was just random shots from all over the city, but something was slightly off. It didn't seem they weren't monitoring anyone or anything. One seemed to be focused on a piece of sidewalk while it's little arms were doing something, sometimes coming onto the screen. Others were wide shots of buildings, a car, a close-up of a _wall?!_

 _What's going on here?_

She took another step into the room. The bot by his right shoulder twitched it's arms sharply and gave a 'bowg-rrrrr' sound that made him look up, first at it, as if saying "really?" and then turned fully around to face her.

* * *

The high-pitched scream Minion let out when he saw her was only a few decibel lower than the screaming from Megamind's 'Screaming Piranhas of Doom' he'd used against Metro Man a few years ago, and Roxanne almost had to cover her ears.

Those piranhas had actually been one of his more successful plots. Metro Man had visibly cringed and shaken his head when he got close them.

Roxanne was very happy she had been supplied with earmuffs. Megamind had used some too (spiky black ones), but that had also been the ultimate cause of Metro Man destroying the fish so quickly. Megamind hadn't heard him coming so he could spring the secondary trap and, as usual, wound up in prison again.

Personally Roxanne thought he had been unnecessarily rough while arresting Megamind that time, but she'd kept that to herself. Megamind was the _villain_. He- sort of deserved it. Possibly... Maybe? And maybe having superhearing while within ten miles of those piranhas made Metro Man grumpy…

Not that it was an excuse for "police brutality" and she'd had a talk with him about it later, away from the other reporters. She wondered if he'd said sorry like he said he would...

\- Whf…!

The sound from the fish brought Roxanne back from her brief walk down memory lane.

If Minion hadn't been in the head-bowl of the gorilla-suit his toothy jaws would have been sweeping the concrete floor in the bunker-like room. His eyes looked ready to just roll out of his head and float to the bottom. The control panel he leaned back onto creaked alarmingly from the weight of his robotic body, Minion looking like he was trying to keep as far away from her as possible, possibly wanting to crawl over to the other side and hide behind it.

\- Miss Ritchi?!

It came out like an astonished squeak and he just stood there, frozen. She didn't know what she had expected but she was still surprised. She had been pretty sure his first words would be something along the lines of a command to the brainbots to 'restrain her'. Not a semi-frightened squeak of shock.

Minion was always polite during kidnappings. He always made sure she was comfortable, that the ropes were just tight enough to keep her safe (safe, not 'restrained') and always had some new treat he was trying out and wanted her input on, but she'd expected him to take action against intruders (even her) when his boss obviously wasn't around.

Instead he just continued to stare at her, frozen.

\- Um, hi.

She gave him a careful wave and a smile before taking a step into the overstuffed room.

\- But! Wha...? Where did...? WHAT?!

He stood there spluttering and just looking generally shocked out of his bowl at suddenly finding the reporter sneaking up on him. Roxanne was pretty shocked herself, but for other reasons. She had been sure the blue villain would be right next to his henchfish, tinkering with some doom-contraption or doing whatever he did when he took a break (if he ever took breaks in the first place).

The surprise of _not_ finding him with Minion made her momentarily forget she could just simply _ask_ him.

Her hesitant wave at the fish seemed to bring him out of his trance after the little outburst. He visibly shook himself, waving his mechanical arms in a frenzied 'what-are-you-doing-here-don't-move-don't-look-oh shit-oh shit-oh shit' kind of way, a wild look in his eyes, took one step towards her and froze again. He stared at her, eyes bulging, fins trembling in indecisive agitation and jaw hanging low showing every tooth in his mouth.

What was he supposed to do?!

Miss Ritchie was in Evil Lair, in the surveillance room! What was she doing here?!

Sir always called her 'nosy reporter' and she did have a camera, but at the moment she looked like she didn't even know it was there. He thought about the guard-bots by the door and briefly wondered why they hadn't stopped her. He promised himself he'd have a long, nice talk to them explaining just WHY YOU DON'T LET NOSY REPORTERS INTO EVIL LAIR!

What was he supposed to do now?!

 _Oh no, no, no… she can't be here! Damn those stupid brainbots! I'll dismantle them all!_

Then he remembered he had activated 'protocol1' to find Sir. _Ooooh… right..._ That one overrode every other protocol except his direct order face-to-eyestalk.

He must have forgotten to give the order to guard the entrance again after activating the protocol. He _had_ been quite stressed. (He still was).

Every single brainbots would ignore her now unless he told them to do something to her.

 _Ohhhh, Sir's going fry me when he finds out I let her into Evil Lair!_

He was incredibly lucky it was Miss Ritchi who'd gotten in and not a cop. Or anyone else for that matter. But still, she was here! That was bad enough! What did she want? What should he do?

And how did she even _find_ Evil Lair? Let alone the entrance? Let alone the SURVEILLANCE ROOM!?

 _Should I_ _tie her to a chair now?_

No, that would be very rude.

Roxanne looked at him with a bemused expression as Minions huge mechanical body _shuffled it's feet_ and he looked down at his toes, eyes shifting all over the place, obviously thinking hard.

Finally his instincts as a polite host kicked in. This wasn't a kidnapping. That had to mean she was a guest, right? And you didn't tie up guests. That was just very bad manners.

He took a look at the huge bank of monitors, still showing brainbot-views from all over the city, checking again if any bots had found anything.

 _Nothing_...

He sighed and looked back at her. He blinked like he came back from somewhere far away, then turned around to get a chair and gestured for her to sit without saying a word.

Roxanne looked at him for several seconds, then down to the chair. It wasn't her regular kidnapping-chair. It was black and leather and absolutely _huge_ to accommodate Minion's size, crested with sharp spikes all along the ridge of the back and down the sides, armrests and the edge of the seat. Living in a robotic gorilla suit the spikes wouldn't bother Minion, but she doubted Megamind with his sudden and sometimes acrobatic movements ever came near it. He'd be impaled in three seconds.

She didn't think Minion even registered what chair he offered her, but it didn't bother her. He was obviously stressed.

She looked back at Minion but he didn't look like he was going to tie her up to the unusual chair, so she decided she'd just go with it and trust him. She sat down very carefully and used her feet to swivel it back around so she faced Minion again (that took some leg-muscle, the chair weighed a ton!).

\- Thank you, Minion.

\- Of course, Miss Ritchi.

He took a couple of steps back, carefully stepping over the power cords on the floor, and just stood there, looking vastly uncertain and a little uncomfortable. He kept casting glances at the bank of monitors behind him but didn't move to explain anything.

Roxanne had no idea what to say or do now. She had expected to find Megamind right beside Minion, cackling about how silly she was for worrying or yelling at the brainbots for letting her in, but now she wasn't sure where to start. If he'd been in another part of the lair, Minion would have called for him or sent a brainbot but that hadn't happened. Maybe just jumping right in would be for the best? She _had_ broken into the lair and at least found one of the villainous duo.

 _Come on, girl! Get to the point!_

\- Sooo...

 _Oh, yeah, great start. You're a star reporter! Get a grip!_

Minion beat her to the punch.

\- Miss Ritchi, I don't want to sound rude, but- what exactly are you doing here?

Minion knew it wasn't polite to question guests like that, but he was very very busy. He needed to get back to work.

Minion was giving her a strange look that she couldn't identify. A sort of mix between sheepishness, suspicion, fear and curiosity.

\- Yeah, so, I was kind of looking for your boss...

She gave him a slightly apologetic look and made sure to keep her arms close to her body so she didn't get poked by the spikes adorning Minion's chair. She had to sit almost on the edge of the seat to not spear her own legs, too. This thing was _covered_ in them!

 _She's looking for Sir? Why? What is_ _she up to?_

His eyes narrowed in suspicion. They were her kidnappers, what could she possibly want with his boss?

 _An interview perhaps?_

No, that was unlikely. She had never asked for one before, so why would she do so now? Finally wanting an interview when they'd stopped kidnapping her, and not even hinting at it just a few weeks ago? No, too far-fetched. Blackmail perhaps? Has she found something on Sir that she wanted to exploit? That was a possibility, but he didn't think that was her style. If she had something on him they'd read about it on the front page of every newspaper in the city and see it on her station's broadcasts.

So what was she doing here? He couldn't tell her where Sir was either! And on top of that he was a terrible liar, she would probably see right through him and he had been close to panicking for the last four weeks and he had gotten very little sleep and...

\- He's not here.

There, that was true, he hadn't lied and she would leave now so he could work. They could relocate Evil Lair after he found Sir again.

\- Where is he?

 _Oh no..._

\- Oh, well, he's... out. Um, doing some... fieldwork?

He could feel himself flushing and starting to stammer. He was a horrible liar, especially when Miss Ritchie looked at him like _that_. He recognized the Look. It was the one she used on unwilling interviewees when they didn't cooperate. The Look that said loud and clear 'I know you're hiding something'.

That Look had made a politician admit to corruption on _live TV_!

He was in trouble.

\- Field work, huh?

She arched an eyebrow, crossed her arms and leaned a little back in the chair (carefully), all the while keeping eye-contact and giving the little spacefish a half-smile.

 _Oh crap_.

He should have said something else. He should have said Sir was out talking to an employee! That was true, technically. Or that he didn't know his whereabouts just now, he wasn't Sir's keeper after all, he did as he wanted! That was true, too! Oh, why hadn't he thought about that first!?

Roxanne saw Minion clearly cringed at her tone of voice. Now she knew he was hiding something. Maybe Megamind was working on something really huge? Or had gone on a vacation while Minion watched the city (for evil purposes of course)? No, that didn't explain the funny behavior of the brainbots.

\- Come on, Minion. Where is he? I haven't been kidnapped in a month! That hasn't happened, ever, since you guys started. Clearly something's going on. Now spill!

That was more like it. If she treated this like an interview she knew she would get her answers. Was that a flicker of fear in his eyes?

 _Oh yeah, I got_ _him now!_

\- Miss Ritchi...

He couldn't stand that look. It was hypnotic! Like a lie detector that immediately _punished_ lies!

And so he broke.

He told her about how Sir had avoided getting caught by using brainbots as decoys after confusing everyone with a smoke-bomb (blue smoke of course, oh Sir was going to get mad if he ever knew he'd told Miss Ritchi this).

\- Please, Miss Ritchi, don't tell him I told you this!

Minion looked miserable, but this information was gold!

 _No. I'm not here for some news report._

She looked at him with evaluating eyes for several seconds.

\- Okay Minion. Anything you tell me is off the record for the time being. I promise.

\- Oh, thank you, Miss Ritchi!

Minion almost did a flip in his tank. He knew when she promised something Miss Ritchie would keep it. He told her how Sir had actually already been in handcuffs and the idiot fresh-from-academy officer thought he was secured (they had shown that on TV, showing everyone they were 'safe' again).

Everyone knew Megamind was to be considered an extreme flight risk until he was in his cell. At least four officers should watch him at all times until he was locked in his specially designed cell. Then he was degraded to 'significant risk'.

He had escaped and they had met up at Evil Lair and celebrated a bit.

Minion had gotten away long before the police arrived, just like he always did. He had to stage Sir's escape if he was arrested again.

The plan may have been another failure, but the escape had gone perfectly. Enough of a reason to celebrate and Megamind had asked Minion to make something 'extra good' for dinner.

Later that night, after tinkering somewhere in the massive workshop for a few hours, Sir had gone out to check on a tip about one of their 'employees' skimming off the top and to 'persuade' him to Not Do That Anymore. Minion had wanted to go with him, but instead ended up staying at Evil Lair to fix some brainbots Metroman had lasered and then get dinner started.

He had gotten so engrossed in a particular brainbot he'd lost track of time. He'd almost had to dismantle the whole thing, replace some circuitry and give it a new dome. Working with circuitry with his large fingers were time-consuming!

\- By the time I finished I just went straight to the kitchen! I assumed Sir was back and had just gone to his room to shower before dinner.

Minion was getting agitated and was spinning around inside his dome. He was worried about how much he could tell her, he always said too much, but she said it was off the record...

Roxanne stood up from the chair and put a hand on one of his furry shoulders to try to calm him down. They wouldn't get anything done if he panicked. And she hated where this was heading. _Minion_ didn't know where Megamind was?

Her presence seemed to help and he calmed down enough to continue the story.

One hour after he'd started dinner the food was on the table but no Sir had shown up.

\- Usually he's never far away when my version of macaroni and cheese is on the menu.

Sometimes Minion would swear Sir had some sort of mac' and cheese radar, so that he never missed out.

Roxanne had to hide a laugh thinking about the Master of all Villainy having mac 'n cheese as his favorite dish.

Minion had waited twenty minutes, getting a bit annoyed that his master was so slow, before he went up to knock on his door. But Sir's room had been empty and when Minion checked for the invisible car (thoroughly) he had finally realized something was wrong.

\- He didn't even answer his- uuuh- radio? Either... And that's really worrying! He always answer! Sir is easily caught up in spontaneous projects and forget to tell me, so not finding him wasn't really a big deal, but not answering the- radio- is unheard of!

Minion had first scoured Evil Lair to see if he was hiding in one of the smaller workrooms (sometimes Megamind liked to have absolute privacy while tinkering and Minion had never figured out what he did or made those times). Then he'd sent brainbots to Frank to see if anything had happened there. When that was a dead end he'd turned on the tracker in the invisible car and found it parked where they usually did when visiting Frank.

There were no signs of trouble by the car, no blood, no nothing! That was when Minion had realized his boss, his best friend, his brother, was _gone_!

That night when leaving Evil Lair was the last time Minion had seen his boss. He'd gotten a message that he was done with Frank and was heading back. And then Megamind had dropped off the face of the Earth...

\- So you're telling me he's been missing for a month?! Why on earth didn't you tell me?

Roxanne was shocked. Four weeks. Four _weeks_ missing and no-one knew! There had been reports about incidents looking very supervillain-y but never any actual observations of the blue menace…

* * *

 **Four weeks before Roxanne enters Evil Lair:**

That should do it. If Frank didn't understand now how important it was to his own health _not_ to skim off of what Megamind took in from his business he wouldn't have any other choice than to actually _hurt_ the idiot.

Hopefully his little display of just _who_ was the actual boss around town would be enough. Frank may be an idiot but he wasn't completely brain-dead so he should have gotten his point.

He stepped out of the shabby (definitely _not_ 'shabby chic') doorway and into the desolate street. This part of town, just called 'Dockside', was the so-called 'bad' side of town and only people with something to hide or something to sell ever came down here. And him, of course. He had to check up on his 'employees' from time to time, didn't he?

He headed for the car while calculating the amount Frank had stolen from him based on the accumulated discrepancies the last few months (that took about 0.7 seconds) and then thought about the last twenty-four hours.

He'd been lucky today, managing to escape after Metro Man melted his latest evil robot and delivering him to the idiot rookie officer. That meant he had the time for some 'domestic' work with the other elements he had regular dealings with. Like Frank. The idiot.

Frank _was_ just a low-level smuggler, but Megamind had regular dealings with him. He had the contacts to bring a lot of the more customs-sensitive equipment in from Romania for him.

He could of course do it himself, but he usually had his hands full with controlling the rest of the criminal underworld, not to mention destroying Metro Man. Using Frank just made more sense.

So he outsourced what he felt the mindless drones could handle by themselves and made sure to visit them regularly. _Maybe that's the problem with Frank_. Megamind dealt with him at least once a month, sometimes more.

Maybe he thought they were 'buddies' or something. That he could take more than his share from his other ventures without repercussions.

He needed to realize you weren't 'buddies' with the resident supervillain. You were happy you were even allowed to stay in business, and you should be ecstatic if said supervillain had any _use_ for your business.

You did NOT embezzle from the supervillain, that guaranteed a one-way ticket out of town if your business was replacable.

Frank was useful enough that he wanted to keep him around, though, saving Megamind a lot of time, so instead of sending him away he'd told him the next time he heard as much as a whisper of something not squeaky clean from Frank he would let a pack of brainbots play rough with him.

He hated that, but how else could he keep the criminal drones from wreaking too much havoc in town?

They had to respect him and obey him without question. Not that he did a lot of commanding, usually they did as they wanted as long as they didn't cross the established rules.

But, humans were violent by nature, and they didn't respect anyone they didn't fear. And the only way he, as a supervillain with hidden moral standards, was going to get that respect was either by a show of strength (like his Metroman battles, you weren't weak if you got pummeled by him a few times a month and could still break out of prison the same day) of by physical confrontation with the drone in question.

He hated the one-on-one with humans, they were weird, with too small heads and strange body-shapes. Well, all but one human. He _liked_ Roxanne's body. And head. And- _stop it! You're not allowed to think that!_

Some humans were so stupid they didn't understand anything else than _you do as I say when I say or you and you whole family will be gator-food_.

Yerh, dragging family into the deal was a last ditch effort to make them understand if he really needed them, but if it was necessary he didn't hesitate.

He only prayed to any god that just might be out there that it wouldn't come to that, because if he didn't follow up on threats they were null and void... Then he may as well just pack up and leave Metrocity entirely.

His biggest wish right now was that he never would have to make good on most of his threats. Not that he had outright promised to kill anyone, but he didn't like hurting anyone, especially not family members who had never done anything to him.

Lost in his musings about his management of Metrocity's underworld he walked down the cracked sidewalk, not even noticing the slight drizzle that had turned into actual rain, past empty warehouses, closed-down shops and one brave little coffee-shop still trying to survive in this neighborhood (they were late paying their insurance. He'd stop by them tomorrow, now he wanted to get home to Minion's cooking!).

He lifted his wrist and pressed a little button on the side of what looked like a watch.

\- Minion, I'm done at Frank's, I'm heading back now, have dinner ready, will you?

\- Sure thing, boss. I'm almost done with the last brainbot.

-Great, see you in fifteen.

* * *

 **Back in Evil Lair:**

\- Four weeks… _actually_ missing for four weeks...? Minion-

She looked up at him with confusion written all over her face. She just couldn't wrap her head around it. Sure, they had both technically been missing for a month but she'd never even thought about one of them going missing from the other! This made everything so much worse! They always knew where the other one was! Or so it had seemed.

Had Minion been looking for him this entire time?

 _Duh, of course he has!_

She couldn't help but think of that rule of thumb the FBI used; the first forty-eight hours were critical. _Hours_! And it had been... 696 hours now! Give or take a few... And only because of Minion did no-one know he was even missing.

\- You staged those incidents to make it look like he was still here.

It wasn't an accusation, just a statement. She understood why Minion had done it. If anyone suspected the head of the underworld was MIA there would be chaos. Villains would start climbing the ladder and showing off in an effort to become the new 'king of the hill' and she doubted any of them had the same moral standards as Megamind. They wouldn't care who they hurt or killed. Or kidnapped...

\- Why would you-

He trailed off, forgetting what he was going to ask. Minion was shocked and had to consciously close his toothy jaw with a sharp 'click'. He hadn't heard anything beyond Miss Ritchi demanding why he hadn't told her.

Hadn't _told_ her? She was _upset_ about Sir missing? Shouldn't she be- she should be _happy_! Right? Her kidnapper was gone and- and she'd had a normal life for a _month_. She should be dancing in the streets, not be upset with not being told he was nowhere to be found!

Yet here she was, not only did she find it but she _broke in_ to Evil Lair, actively looking for his Sir, her personal 'alien abductor', looking like she hadn't slept in days, her clothes a little rumpled and far from the professional elegance she usually wore for the camera. Was she actually _worried_?!

He sighed, a little perplexed, really surprised, very uncertain about this whole new development but most of all just tired. He could understand why Sir was sweet on this woman. She was smart!

And not just the average 'smart' found around town, but _really_ smart. The kind of smart that had her questioning everything and refusing to just accept things as they appeared on the surface.

Like the fact that she had never really been afraid of either Sir or himself.

The first time they had kidnapped her she had of course been surprised, maybe even worried, but in stead of screaming, like they were expecting, she had started questioning them! She even made a jab at Sir's invention of doom! The first time!

He had a suspicion that she saw right through Sir's 'Evil Supervillain'-facade. Some times she would comment on something that he did or said that made Minion think twice.

Sir usually didn't catch these small signs, but from behind the scene Minion had an excellent view on their interaction. And she was _nice_ to _him_ , too! Usually when people saw the huge gorilla-body they screamed and ran for it. The first time Miss Ritchi had seen him she'd said 'wow, that's so cool!'.

That had been his first compliment from a human! Well, mostly Sir's compliment since he was the one who had designed it, but she had been interested in how he operated it too and started digging for information, and he had answered too, until Sir had rather angrily told him that 'we do not discuss technology or anything else with our victims!'.

Was it possible she _cared_ a little about Sir? At least enough that she didn't want him hurt or dead? It certainly looked that way.

He was tempted to think 'Stockholm Syndrome', but that needed trauma to actually develop (he'd checked), and Miss Ritchi had never experienced anything traumatic in Megamind's clutches. They had both made sure of that. There was a reason Minion always played the polite host, offering her cookies or cakes, hot tea or coffee on cold days or ice cold, refreshing beverages in the summer. But they did still kidnap her, ruin her days, making her late for work and so-on. She should _not_ care about any of them.

But against all odds it seemed like she did. So what should he do now? He could say he had it covered and throw her out of Evil Lair. Or he could let her help if she wanted, and perhaps find Sir before it was too late.

He thought hard for several minutes. As it were, Sir was missing, his only lead was a dehydrated trashcan not far from where he'd found the invisible car, apart from the brainbots he was alone in his search and could use any help he could get.

The decision was easy.

\- Miss Ritchi, would- would you mind helping me find him?

Roxanne could only stare at him in confusion. Was that really a question?

\- Of course! That's why I came here in the first place, I had to know he was- where he was! Where you _both_ were!

\- Oh thank you Miss Ritchi! I knew you'd help!

Minion immediately perked up, his positive nature showing. And she'd almost said 'all right' or something similar. She had come to see if Sir was okay! She _did_ care!

Two heads were always better than one. Now he had to fill her in on the details of his investigation, though it wasn't much. The most important part was the breakthrough not long ago, but even that was just a cubed trashcan.

They spent the better part of an hour going over his finds (which wasn't much) until Miss Ritchi said she wanted to see where he had found the cube.

* * *

 **Four weeks before Roxanne enters Evil Lair**

The coffee-shop probably wouldn't last much longer. A pity, they made an excellent espresso, but that wasn't enough to keep them open in this neighborhood. Should he stop by before going back? It might be his last chance. Who knew how much longer they'd stay open... Or maybe he'd help them relocate instead!

The view in this part of town was too depressing for the customers anyway, only drab brick walls or crumbling concrete with rusty cars in the streets. Almost every building looked about ready to collapse in the next winter storm. The city didn't care enough about disused warehouses or rotting stores to use any budget money to re-purpose or build new infrastructure here to revive the area. It made for good plot-locations though, he only made Metroman demolish buildings that already were unsafe! Hah!

Oh, he could get them a nice location closer to the city center! He knew the perfect spot, that little bookshop in the Green district. They were the worst case of amateurish fencing operation he'd ever seen and the bookshop-cover was a joke. How the police hadn't raided them already he would never understand... Much better to get something useful in that spot. Then he could keep getting quality caffeine in tiny mugs holding liquid so strong it would have curled his hair if he had any.

He kept walking and finally noticed the rain soaking into his suit and running down his neck. He usually looked magnificent with the huge, flared collar, but walking around in the rain it only served as an immense funnel. He was certain he'd already collected several liters that were running down his spine and finally into his boots. They were already making squishing sounds with every step. Damn! It was impossible to look suitably intimidating in soaking clothes!

Being deep in thought was probably why he didn't pick up on that 'something's wrong' feeling as fast as usual.

Just as he passed a run-down building that once used to house a mechanical shop doubling as a money-laundering spot (that owner had been run out of town when he'd tried his hand at human trafficking, specifically young girls) he sensed someone walking up behind him.

Who on this godforsaken planet was _stupid_ enough to try to mess with him? He wasn't even wearing a disguise! Everyone could see who he was! Sure, Minion wasn't with him today, but seriously? He had proven time and again he didn't need any backup to kick ass. How slow were these Homo sapiens on the uptake?!

Besides, in this area he _was_ the true Overlord and what kind of overlord would go around hiding himself? He made a point of never using disguises when he was in this part of the city.

Well, except when he was working, like if he got tips about morons like Frank and he wanted to confirm it before showing up in person.

It was more evil too, when he knew all the details about someone's attempt to swindle him. He'd let them try to explain, how 'everything was a misunderstanding' and how they'd 'never even _think_ about conning him'. It could be quite entertaining some times!

Oh, and going undercover! Now _that_ was fun! He always had to keep himself from laughing out loud and blowing his cover when he played 'the idiot henchman'. He had to concentrate hard to find the stupidest answer when he was asked something!

He chuckled a little to himself and shook his head when thinking of his last undercover adventure, still keeping a mental eye on his would-be assailants. Whoever it was that was trying to sneak up on him was joined by another. _So, ganging up on the Overlord, eh?_ He wasn't worried, though. Only two opponents? That wouldn't even be enough to break a sweat! This could actually be fun! It's nice with a little workout now and then.

And two thugs was fucking ridiculous. Insulting actually! Two? Had it been ten, then maybe they'd stood a chance when he was alone. Put Minion in the mix and they hadn't reached their limit so far (their record so far was twenty-three).

But this time he _was_ alone, so he hoped for no more that five or six. That would make it interesting without too much to do. They couldn't _possibly_ be stupid enough to only be two, could they? But then again, they were only human...

He kept walking, making sure he didn't change his pace, looked back or did anything else that would tell them he knew they were there, leaving them happily oblivious.

He passed the car, which was currently invisible. _If_ something should happen to him he didn't want them to know where it was, Minion would pick it up if need be.

Thirty feet later he spotted number three waiting in an alleyway. _All right, getting interesting_.

Number three took a step out and headed towards him and his two followers and soon two more were crossing the road. Boxed in. Morons on three sides and a brick wall on the fourth.

He stopped as if he was surprised to see the one in front and casually let his hand go still close to his de-gun, preparing to draw, just in case they were sporting guns. His armor was effective, but he hadn't tested it on point-blank range yet, and he wasn't about to take a chance like that. _He_ wasn't stupid.

But they were; no guns.

It was raining pretty heavily now, the water still creeping down his neck making him shiver down his back, and getting into his eyes. He was drenched! So, dehydration wouldn't work, but his most prized invention had other settings just in case things got ugly...

He let them get closer, giving them a feeling of power, that they actually stood a chance and a false sense of safety in numbers. He was outnumbered only in the strictest theoretical sense of the word, but they didn't know that.

They had him completely surrounded, but still at a relatively safe distance (or so they thought, he just didn't bother to show them how wrong they were), and he made sure to memorize each face. In case someone escaped he wanted to be sure he could track them down later.

He already knew the two standing on his left side and nodded to them.

\- Phil, Jerry.

They both looked down and shuffled their feet when the blue alien acknowledged their names. They wanted to be anywhere but here, but they were in too deep to back out now. It was too late as soon as the supervillain had laid his eyes on them.

Megamind regarded them. He was surprised to see those two, he'd never guessed they had guts to agree to something like this. Someone must be holding something over their heads as leverage. This was probably a 'debts all paid'-job for them.

They were both small-time crooks, one of them dealing mainly with breaking and entering and selling what he could.

The other one Megamind had no tolerance for what so ever; drug dealer. That creep even sold to kids before Megamind "persuaded" him to implement an age limit. But no he knew of several parents who'd had to bury their children because of this worm, even after the last time they'd had a 'chat'.

He would make sure to use his chance for a little payback now that he had him. He wouldn't be selling anything when Megamind was done with him this time.

Looking around at the other three he thought he recognized a scar on the one to his far right, though only from a description from years ago by one of his uncles. He'd never met the guy personally but knew he should be careful with that one.

The last two were complete strangers so he reserved judgment for later.

Making a point to look each of them straight in the eyes he gave them a feral grin. He could see it unnerved them. _First point to me_.

 _He_ looked like the predator, not the other way around, and that would scream 'wrong, wrong, wrong' in their heads. The "smile" (Evil smile #2) sharp and showing too many teeth- that along with the shadows made by the single bulb illuminating the street (he was an expert in using shadows to his advantage) made him look even more like the alien he was. The _dangerous_ alien he was. A dangerous alien looking at them like a lion would look at a herd of sheep.

\- Good evening, gentlemen.

* * *

 **Sorry if my use of Italic are confusing.**

 **I try to keep subconscious thought and what can be considered just environmental information in parenthesis.**

 **Actual thoughts are in Italic but also when I want to emphasize words… Bold would be too imposing and distracting I think… I hope it comes across which is which as well as I hope it does… And any suggestions are appreciated!**

 **I may also come back and edit published chapters, just because I'm a nit-picky person and always find stuff to improve AFTER publishing... :-P**

 **I said I'd be back ;-) I just had to mention, the look Megamind gives them in the end looks something like the amazing picture on DeviantArt by LockworkOrange. I can't link to it but if you want to see just search the name and the pic is called "Megamind".**


	4. Looking

**GAH! I'm so sorry it's taken sooooo long! This part is a bitch to write, so I decided to give you a shorter one (but I guess I forgot about the 'short' part...), just so nobody would come and beat me over the head with a brainbot or something.**

 **And I think I forgot to mention that this is an AU, the movie never happens ;-)**

* * *

Roxanne exited the invisible (but currently visible) car and stood by the side of the road, looking at a brick wall just like any other wall in this area; old, crumbly, tagged and grimy.

Minion had been heading around to open the door for her, like the gentlefish he was, but she'd been in too much of a rush to wait for him and jumped out before he even got out of the car. He'd still taken it in stride (of course) and closed the car door gently behind her.

* * *

The invisible car was, to say it lightly, _amazing_! It was the first time she'd ever been in it conscious and voluntarily, and inside it hadn't looked like anything she'd come to expect from the blue genius.

Apart from a few extra buttons and levers, an LCD-screen you obviously never saw in regular Hudsons, a gear-stick unlike any she'd ever seen in her life and the reinforced seat for Minion it was just like any other restored vintage car.

In other words; not the tricked out, crazy, pimped, over-the-top car one would expect from Megamind.

It was actually _classy_!

The dash was gleaming, polished ebony, not a scratch on it, with black leather and silver accents. The large display was surrounded by chrome, just like the original would have been.

(Roxanne knew vintage cars, her dad was crazy about them and when she was little she'd helped him restore a Hudson).

The steering wheel appeared mostly original, but there were a few extra levers on the left-hand side of the column, with no markings at all, and Megamind's insignia in the center. The front seats had been replaced with reinforced single seats to support Minion's heavy body and make room for a raised middle console, but everything kept with the style of the rest of the car. The back seats were either original or perfect replicas, and all the leather used for the door interior and roof was (of course) black and so was the wood and carpet.

 _Megamind has class. Who would have thought!_

Sure, the outside didn't look like the original design, but he was a _supervillain_ , so she guessed he had to do something flashy to keep up the image. And knowing him, the fins and spikes probably _did_ something. A 'hidden in plain sight'-weapon perhaps.

All of his inventions were flashy and usually spiky, but after several years up close she knew he almost never put useless things into his designs. Every single spike, bolt, arm or fin served a purpose, no matter how ridiculous they looked.

She could hear the engine was either tuned up or brand new or... _something,_ too _._ The sound it made was completely unique; a deep rumble she felt in her lungs coming together with a higher-pitched whooshing sound, unexpectedly harmonic. But Minion had denied her even the tiniest little peek under the hood! That had _not_ helped her curiosity! Especially with that wary, semi-frightened look on Minion's face when she asked. She knew it had to be special when even _he_ didn't tell her! Minion was _always_ easy to sneak information out of.

* * *

They were in a run-down part of town, where every building seemed dead, the only exception being a small café three buildings down the street, but it was closed for the day. Too bad, Roxanne needed a coffee, but even the first bars had closed by now.

It had been late afternoon when she found the entrance to the lair and still light outside, but she'd spent so much time snooping around and then talking to Minion and getting up to date on his investigation, that by now it was almost two in the morning.

She sent a quiet thanks to whatever deity may be out there; at least it wasn't raining! But there was no moon and the clouds hung long in the sky now, contrasting with the warm day it had been earlier, making the streets darker than usual, especially when there were so few working street-lights.

So now Roxanne found herself swiping a flashlight over broken walls and crumbling sidewalks, looking for leads that was left four weeks ago.

Yeah, this was gonna be a piece of cake...

She looked around the area, hearing Minion clanking around in the background, and had a feeling of- familiarity? No that wasn't it. It- it was more like a missing piece in a jigsaw that she could see what was but not where belonged. Except she _wasn't_ sure what it was either... But she was sure she hadn't been in this part of town in _ages_. Still, that coffee-shop seemed faintly familiar, somehow, and the area just felt _important_!

\- This is it?

She looked back at Minion who nodded.

\- Yes Miss Ritchie. I found the cube over there...

Minion pointed to the mouth of an alley where Roxanne could see a door with a single light-bulb barely illuminating anything, and next to it was an overflowing dumpster with additional trash-bags stacked up next to it. She could see why the cube hadn't been rehydrated that night; there was a clearly home-made wooden awning over the door that also covered the dumpster, keeping it dry.

\- ...under that lean by the dumpster, near the wall. That's all I've found so far. Whoever took him must have been really careful to not leave anything else behind... I guess they didn't think a dehydrated trashcan was anything to worry about, but at least now we know where whatever it was went down.

\- I'm not so sure about 'careful' as I am about 'lucky'. The light from the cube should have been pretty obvious, don't you think?

He blinked at that. Why hadn't he thought of that? It was so obvious now that Miss Ritchie mentioned it!

 _How could I be so stupid!_

He had assumed whoever kidnapped Sir knew what they were doing, that they were pros hired by someone. He had executed his search based on that assumption too!

\- But-

Roxanne continued

\- whoever it was, was probably in a rush, and if the cube fell under the dumpster I guess it would have been pretty hard to spot.

She couldn't just say nothing when she saw the face Minion made at her comment about 'lucky' versus 'careful'. He'd looked like he personally was responsible for Megamind's vanishing act!

\- And are you sure someone kidnapped him? He isn't just out- I don't know - roadtripping or something? Blowing off some steam if someone actually jumped him? I've seen him fight, it would take more than a few guys to take him down. I don't think anyone is _that_ stupid... Or maybe he got detoured if he got another tip or something?

Her questions pulled Minion out of his own thoughts and back to the present.

\- No... I- I mean, no, he wouldn't take off like that without telling me. Sir might be spontaneous, but not like that. He'd tell me, it's a safety-thing. He always tells me...

Minion looked around the deserted street, feeling completely lost.

 _Why didn't I go to her before? Barely two minutes and she already has a new take on what happened! I'm a horrible minion!_

Roxanne nodded an 'okay', not sure what to say, and started walking around, shining a flashlight around on the ground, covering every nook and cranny but not really seeing, that feeling of familiarity still nagging her. Something about this place felt important and it killed her when she couldn't put the pieces together!

Suddenly her subconscious alerted her to something that seemed slightly off.

\- Hey, come look at this.

Minion looked up from where he was shining a flashlight into the dumpster by the lean, hoping for more clues but not really believing. Miss Ritchie was standing a couple of feet outside the alley, about ten feet away from him, shining her light on a few pieces of what looked like thin, slightly curved glass.

Broken glass by an alley wasn't exactly unheard of, but this looked... out of place. She had no idea why, but Roxanne had learned long ago to trust her gut on seemingly insignificant details. More often than not they lead to a breakthrough.

Minion came over and looked down on the spot she was shining her light.

\- Glass?

He looked at her quizzically, not really sure where she was going with this. It was just a few small pieces. There were plenty of other glass around here, so how come _this_ had caught her attention? And it had been _weeks_ since Sir disappeared, what were the chances something important had survived this long? He couldn't even remember it from the other times he'd been here.

\- We should bring this, I think. You guys have a way to analyze it?

\- Uh- yes, we have the-

Minion suddenly closed his jaws with a 'click' and looked like a deer in oncoming headlights.

Should he tell her? He wasn't sure how much he could divulge to the reporter. She _had_ said everything was off the record, but did that stop her from going to the police? Or Metro Man?

\- Don't worry, I won't.

\- Huh? What- what 'won't'?

She gave him a knowing smile, crossing her arms and cocked her hip.

\- I told you everything is off the record. That includes the police, and everyone else.

Minion could only gawk at her. Had she spontaneously developed mind-reading powers? How did she _do_ that?

\- Oh come on, you're the henchfish of the city's reigning supervillain and I just asked you about your equipment! It's not hard to extrapolate what you're thinking, Minion. Besides, you're almost as easy to read as Megamind.

She just had to give him a wink at that last bit. She found Minion had the cutest expression when he was befuddled! He just kept looking at her with his jaw hanging open.

\- Seriously, though, I promise I won't tell anyone about any of your stuff or places or anything.

She was sincere now, and Minion knew it. She wanted him to trust her, he could see that. She _needed_ him to trust her. And he needed her to trust him. They had to work together on this and they had to truly rely on each other. Sir's life could depended on it!

Could he do it?

* * *

Roxanne knew she didn't have any secret plans or evil inventions to hide, she just had to trust Minion wouldn't kidnap her again, and that wasn't very hard to do.

 _He_ on the other hand, had to trust her to not disclose anything she saw or was told to either the authorities, Metro Man, television or anywhere else. That was a much bigger leap of faith than what she had to do, and she hoped he could.

After a long silence Minion finally nodded. Roxanne had to give him a big smile, relieved Minion had deemed her trustworthy. He had taken so long she was worried he would say no.

Minion smiled back and after a silent agreement they went back to their task; going over the street with a fine-toothed comb.

* * *

 **Four weeks earlier:**

(...- _Good evening, gentlemen.)_

Hah! Megamind had to concentrate not to laugh as the drug-dealer jumped and visibly gulped at the unexpected sound of his greeting. He would be the first to run if Megamind let him.

(He wouldn't let him).

The guy with the scar took half a step closer. Huh, impressive. Especially with that look of uncertainty on his face. Megamind could smell the fear coming from the humans.

\- You're coming with us.

Scarface obviously tried to sound confident, but it came out like the feeble attempt it was. But at least now he knew who the leader of the gang was.

\- What, you're not even gonna offer me a drink first? I don't go home with just anybody, you know. I have standards.

Megamind obviously looked him up and down before giving him an affronted look, feigning insult and holding his hand to his chest, fingers spread, like someone gravely insulted would do in the movies.

\- You don't really have a choice. We're five and you're one. You don't even have the fish with you! You don't stand a chance!

Now one of the unknown ones, the one in the middle, took courage from Scarface and came closer, too.

\- Oh, is that right?

Megamind flashed them all a too-sharp smile that made anyone considering approaching stop.

\- From my position I count twelve ways to have you all flat on your backs in less than a minute. In less than half a minute, actually.

He lowered his voice to a wicked almost-growl, bending his head so that it was almost completely in shadow now. Then he looked up at them through his lashes, his pupils reflecting what little light there was, making his eyes almost glow and treated them all to his most wicked grin and added:

\- Even more ways if I decide to have a little _fun_ first.

He carefully emphasized the word 'fun' with both his voice and his face, hie brows going up the exact right amount at the word and his eyes opening all the way, making him look a bit manic, his eyes alone conveyed all the terrible things he could do to them.

Scarface took his hands out of his coat pockets, his right hand sporting a shiny set of brass knuckles, and took another step forward. His hands were clenching and unclenching, clearly nervous but wanting to appear tough in front of the others.

\- Oh, so you're tough guy, hm?

Megamind couldn't help but taunt him a little. This guy was big and if he got a good hold of Megamind he could do some serious damage. Better stay away from those fists. Megamind might be stronger than humans compared pound by pound but against a guy at least three times his size they were very equally matched. The advantage maybe even leaning towards his opponent.

He had some room, they hadn't backed him right up against the wall, and an alley just a few feet down the street would give him even more room if he needed it. Right now he didn't want much, just a little more and a few feet away from the wall should be plenty.

He was ready to play.

Taking a sudden step forward he said:

\- Boo!

And laughed out loud when all five jumped back from him.

\- Hahah! And you think you're gonna take _me_ down? That's a fucking _joke_!

Megamind snarled, took another quick step towards them, arms out and hands like claws, getting himself another step away from the wall, getting even more room to maneuver. They backed up again. Apparently they waited for an invitation.

\- Well?

He held out his arms in a questioning yet inviting fashion, putting one foot in front of the other and giving them a formal bow, all the while keeping eye contact and that wicked smile on his face.

\- Who's first?

He kept that position, confident and waiting, up until the first thug made his move.

* * *

 **Back in Evil Lair:**

Roxanne and Minion had spent almost three hours going over that part of the street, and all they had to go on was that stupid cube, a tire-track that most likely had nothing to do with anything and some shards of glass. Minion hadn't understood why the few pieces of glass were important, but Miss Ritchie had said to bring them, so he had collected them in a little plastic jar.

Right now he was standing in a smallish room with black-painted brick walls, beside the large central control panel for the collider, full of blinking lights, a sheet of paper in his hand and his mind temporarily blank.

* * *

He leaned lightly on a shiny, stainless-steel tube of about a meter in diameter that was going out in each direction from the panel. There were large collars around the tube every few meters containing sensors and the powerful magnets. The tube ran in a big loop around Evil Lair and partially on the bottom of the lake where it was maintained by aquabots.

It was in essence the same as the particle accelerator at CERN located in Switzerland, just smaller. Sir had found it easier to build this one than an actual mass spectrometer. Those required so much fiddling and some really expensive, rather exotic materials, to get reliable readings, and they couldn't have _any_ fun with it either, so Sir hadn't found it worth the trouble. A collider, on the other hand, would be much simpler, and way more fun.

They often played around to see what happened when different substances crashed at near-speed-of-light velocity. Some elements made really trippy and fascinating light-paths, even outside the collider and all around them in the air. Others would spiral out of control and went pinging off any metal surface before fizzling out while a few didn't even make a pop (boring!).

They had never heard about light-paths from Switzerland (neither in the news or any classified reports that Megamind received regularly thanks to a little program deep in the code of the internet), but of course Sir hadn't gone and made a _normal_ collider.

Megamind used some of his free time to study the particles and in 2002 he'd discovered evidence of the Higgs boson. Humans had kept arguing the existence of it for years to come, but Megamind hadn't seen the point in telling them which side was right. They never gave _him_ a chance, so why should he give _them_ anything?

A few elements were, however, now banned after causing a blast upon collision. They had discovered colliding the same material was relatively safe, usually just making a light-show, but mixing them- well, that often brought some unexpected side-effects.

Aluminum versus tellurium had blown a hole in the side of the tube, a minor annoyance and easily fixed (they'd done it again, timing the explosion to scare some brainbots just for laughs. That lot had been snippy the rest of that week, and one had completely destroyed Sir's baby-seal leather boots).

Thorium versus cobalt had blown a hole in not just the collider tube, but the wall of Evil Lair too, taken out sixteen brainbots, ruined Minion's newest (not even finished) suit, turned the singed edges blue and almost killed Megamind.

Megamind had liked the blue color of the discharge, though, and started getting ideas of how to use it against Metro Man. Minion had to work hard to convince him that trying it again, even on a smaller scale for research, was probably a _Very Bad Idea_.

In short; the collider was useful _and_ fun (and potentially dangerous if Megamind got to play with it by himself. But then again, a glass of water could be dangerous in Megamind's hands.).

* * *

But right now Minion couldn't focus on the fun times he'd had with Sir.

The sensors that monitored the collisions also picked up the component parts on a sub-atomic level, giving them the same results as a mass spectrometer analysis would (actually even more detailed and in half the time).

Now that he was looking at the results all he could focus on was suppressing an ice-cold dread that had started crawling it's way through his body like arctic fingers, and he felt that old, all-consuming hate flare to life.

He was _so_ glad they had brought that glass. He'd seen those readings before. It was almost the same result as one of Sir's own sedatives and looked like the exact same as the original sample.

They rarely used it, but sometimes when Sir was hurt bad enough yet had managed to escape Metro Man (or Minion had hauled him off before the hero could get a hold of him) he'd tell Minion he 'wanted to sleep', since he rarely managed to fall asleep on his own if he was hurting too much.

His body could usually fix itself, but it always took longer if Sir didn't get any sleep. Sir carefully avoided using the word 'needle' or anything resembling it. He hated the little things, but accepted them when there was no alternative, and he'd used several days to invent a needle so thin he barely even felt it but that could still carry the fluid. That didn't mean Minion didn't have to hold him down from time to time, though... He _hated_ when he had to do that to Sir!

He knew how Sir had gotten the original formula that he tweaked, too, and it wasn't a cheery story.

 _He can't be back. He's supposed to be dead!_

Minion had been _sure_ that monster was dead! From what little Sir had told him there should be nobody left! But this put everything Minion thought he knew in doubt and he wondered who else from the past may pop up.

He heard a rustle and almost jumped out of his bowl, being lost in his own memories and thinking it was yet another ghost from the past sneaking up on him. He turned his robotic body around and then had to turn his fishy self around again too, since he'd done both the first time and ended up facing the wrong way.

\- Oh, it's just you!

It was just Miss Ritchie coming into the room with a mug of fresh steaming coffee in her hand with the print "Trust me, I'm an engineer, let's just assume I'm never wrong".

\- Um... who did you think it was?

\- Oh, heh, no- no-one.

He gave her a half-hearted smile.

Brainbot #486, the one with the pink markings, was trailing along after her again. It had apparently taken a shine to Miss Ritchie after she had tossed it that wrench. Then the mug she had in her hands caught Minion's attention.

 _I gave that mug to Sir last Christmas..._

Minion always got him a mug, this year it just said "Super-villain at work". Simple, but it was getting harder to find one he didn't already have. It couldn't just be _anything_ , it had to make a point, and be funny and/or appropriately evil, and Sir was getting quite the collection by now, his favorite being the one that said 'One lab accident away from becoming a supervillain'. Sir was leaving them all over Evil Lair and it was up to Minion to find them again.

Minion knew, of course, that Sir appreciated the gifts, and it wasn't like he didn't care about the mugs, he just got carried away when a new idea suddenly popped into his giant blue head and he forgot about everything else.

Once he had found a mug _inside_ the dome of a brainbot that had needed it's circuitry replaced!

And Sir was always happy when Minion brought back a mug he'd been missing, so he didn't mind. It was his _job_ to take care of Sir! And looking for the mugs had become a sort of game, seeing what kind of strange place Sir would leave his mug next.

Minion wasn't entirely sure how he felt about Miss Ritchie using the mug.

 _Stop that, that's stupid, she's here helping and it's just a mug!_

Sir's mug. His missing Sir's mug that- _stop it!_

\- What's that?

She indicated the sheet of paper in Minion's hand with Sir's- _her_ mug and took a sip, leaning against the door-frame so much like how Sir used to do that Minion had to physically shake himself.

\- Oh, um... It's- it's the result from that glass you found. How'd you know it was important? There were loads of glass all around in that street!

\- I don't know. It just felt like it was. It's worked lots of times before and helped me get some great stories. Remember that ring of pedophiles a few years ago?

Minion simply nodded.

\- I got that one because of some chewing-gum wrapper.

Minion's eyes widened and he stared at her.

\- From bubblegum-wrapper?

He was astonished.

\- Mhm...

She looked at him over the rim of Sir's- ( _her_ mug, dammit!), humming her confirmation.

\- So what's it say?

Minion looked up, almost surprised again that she was there. He'd been lost in his own thoughts again.

\- Oh! Yeah, it's a solid lead, I know who might have him, but there's no guarantee. And I really hope I'm wrong...

He muttered that last part, almost to himself as his gaze fell back to the paper in his hand, but she heard him anyway.

\- What? Why? Isn't it better to know who's got him? Then we can try to anticipate them, figure out where he might be!

Minion looked at her with- fear?

 _What's going on?_

\- Minion, seriously, what do you mean? _Why_ would you wish to be wrong about this?

\- Because, if I'm right he might already be dead.

He whispered the last part, then looked up at her with a strange expression of pure fear mixed with misery, all wrapped up in a sort of 'kicked-puppy' kind of face, fiddling with the paper and shuffling his feet.

He wasn't sure he could make her see the gravity of the situation without explaining, and he really didn't want to rip open those memories. But he soon saw he shouldn't have worried about that. This was Miss Ritchie. She understood immediately.

\- Oh my god...

A hand went to her mouth and she almost dropped her coffee. Roxanne felt her stomach turn into a solid rock from the three pounds of loose pebbles she'd had before and she wanted Minion to say he was joking. That all this was just an elaborate prank and then Megamind would jump out at her, yelling "got you", "April fools" or something. She didn't even think she'd be mad at him! Not at first anyway, later she'd probably be furious and would want to strangle him! But the look on Minion's face told her nobody would come jumping out at her from anywhere.

He was dead serious and it scared the hell out of her!

\- Minion, please tell me you're kidding...

She had to ask, even when she knew he wasn't. There was always a microscopic chance.

Minion gave her a glare and for the first time Roxanne was actually a bit scared of Minion, because _that_ glare could burn through stone.

\- Miss Ritchie, I would _never_ joke about this. If Doc has had him all this time... I almost _hope_ he's dead. I _can't_ let him go through that again! Last time Doc got his claws in Sir- he-

He couldn't even say it. The fear, the _anger_ he'd felt when he finally got his Sir back last time...

They had been seventeen when Sir disappeared from the exercise yard and after spending a month convincing the Warden that Megamind hadn't just escaped and forgotten to bring Minion, they had fought for over a year to get him back, and when they finally did... That was the one and only time Minion had seen the Warden cry.

Minion had genuinely hated the entire human species for months after. Sometimes he still did; if something triggered the memories, like now, he'd feel that ice cold hate returning and for a few moments he wanted the species _extinct_ , with only two exceptions, before Sir would notice and distract him.

Thankfully Miss Ritchie seemed to get the point.

He shook himself and sighed and wished fish could cry.

\- Let's just say it was really bad and he was lucky to live. If it wasn't for the Warden... I- Please, I really don't want to- Look, can we just get back to work?

He looked so miserable Roxanne couldn't help but hug his huge mechanical gorilla body, twisting her hands in the fake fur and hearing how the inner workings of the suit swooshed and whirred and clinked, just offering silent her support to the distressed alien fish. She didn't say anything, but she thought Minion understood.

She _also_ understood that he badly needed a distraction. They had been at this for hours. She let go of his suit and looked up at him.

\- Minion, how about some food?

He blinked down at her, completely caught off guard by the question.

\- Are you hungry, Miss Ritchie? I could whip up something real fast, or-

He stopped when he saw her shaking her head in a 'that's-not-what-I-mean kind of way. He knew what she was doing, he just didn't _want_ her to do it. He wanted to keep working and _find Sir_!

-I could... order something?

Minion made a disgusted face at that. He _really_ didn't care for take-out. Everything tasted bland and any nutrients were boiled out of it and then some. He could make any take-out meal in his own kitchen cheaper and better tasting than any restaurant. Now he was just trying to get Miss Ritchie distracted so he could get back to work.

\- Minion...

She gave him a look that said very clearly 'I know what you're doing'.

\- We've been at this for hours. And when was the last time you ate? Or _slept_?

Minion refused to meet her eyes and mumbled something about 'last night'.

\- Which 'last nigh'? The last night when I found the lair or the last night you actually went to sleep?

Roxanne thought she heard 'Wednesday'. Today was Friday... She smiled up at him, a tired but encouraging smile, and lead the way out of the Collider control room.

-Come on. We both need some food. And then we'll get some sleep. Ah-ah! No, you don't get to argue about this.

She rounded on him and pointed her finger into Minion's chest, looking at him in a demanding way.

\- You've been up for what I suspect is _days_ and you need rest! You're no good for either Megamind or me, running on fumes or zonking out in the middle of something!

Miss Ritchie looking at him like that was almost as bad as Sir, and Minion found himself following her out to the living-portion of Evil Lair. He knew she was right, but he felt like he was failing Sir if he didn't keep going, no matter how tired or hungry he got. Eating or sleeping felt like a waste of time!

* * *

\- Here you go, Miss Ritchie, I hope you like it.

Minion smiled and put down a plate of wonderful-smelling pasta with mushrooms, ham, truffles and a generous sprinkle of Parmesan, everything topped with finely chopped parsley. Miss Ritchie was sitting on the outside of the kitchen bar-island so Minion would have room to move about. He never let Sir into the kitchen after the salsa-incident, so Minion was used to not having other beings in his domain.

He turned around and went back to the fridge to get himself a piece of raw chicken and some iced tea (actually iced, it came in small cubes kept in a tiny freezer atop the fridge). Roxanne had turned down the offer and opted for _warm_ tea instead since the lair was pretty chilly in her opinion.

\- Oh my god, Minion, this is wonderful!

Minion smiled at the compliment and was intending to go back to work after his chicken-and-iced-tea snack, but then he got distracted by the way Miss Ritchie was wolfing down her late dinner (breakfast? It _was_ getting light outside again).

\- Hungry, huh?

Roxanne froze at his comment and looked up, slowly, until she met his eyes, her right hand still holding her fork halfway to her mouth. He didn't make a sound but his eyes were laughing. She hadn't realized just how hungry she was before she started eating. The last solid meal she'd had was that toast for lunch before she ditched Hal after her last report on Friday. Now it was almost Saturday morning!

\- Uh... Heh, yeah, I guess...

She gave him a embarrassed smile and put her fork back down on the plate.

\- Sorry, Minion. That was rude of me. It really is delicious, I guess I didn't know how hungry I was.

\- It's okay, Miss Ritchie, I don't mind. Sorry I stared.

\- Really, when are you going to start calling me Roxanne?

Minion suddenly looked slightly uncomfortable and looked down at his feet.

\- Oh, well, if- if you don't mind, I'd really prefer 'Miss Ritchie'. It's- just a- I don't-

He didn't like having to deny anyone anything, especially not Miss Ritchie, but it just felt so...impolite.

\- Or just stick to 'Miss Ritchie' if you rather want that. It's not that I mind, it just seems a bit, you know, formal, between friends.

\- Sorry... Roxanne...

Minion had to try but made a weird face when he called her by her first name. It just felt wrong. He shook his body.

\- That felt strange... I'd rather stick with Miss Ritchie, if you don't mind...

Minion looked like a puppy begging for treats, and Roxanne couldn't help but laugh at the situation. Here she was, eating home-made truffle-pasta in the lair of two villains at five in the morning, helping to find the city's missing supervillain, _worrying_ about the alien who kidnapped her several times a month! And now they were discussing the proper way to address her, the _henchfish_ being the one preferring the more respectful variant! When, exactly, had her life become _this_ crazy?

\- Don't worry about it, you can call me whatever you want.

Roxanne gave him a smile and started saying something more, but never got that far. A huge yawn interrupted her and she suddenly felt how utterly exhausted she was.

\- Oh! I'll find you somewhere to sleep, Miss Ritchie!

Minion's suit jumped and started walking out of the kitchen.

\- Or would you rather I take you home?

Minion wasn't sure where she could sleep if she stayed in Evil Lair. There was only one bed in Evil Lair and that was Sir's bed. Minion didn't feel comfortable letting her sleep in that, but where else could she stay? They didn't exactly have a guest bedroom; they never had _guests_! He should probably take her home, she'd be more comfortable there anyway.

\- Oh, no, I'll just crash here. Didn't I see a couch here somewhere?

 _The sofa? She prefers the sofa over me taking her home? Huh..._

\- Besides, it's only for a few hours and it'll save us time. And I need to make sure _you_ get some sleep, too.

She looked around absently, as if the couch was in the kitchen they were currently occupying, Minion having stopped in the doorway.

She didn't notice Minion's face at her comment about _her_ watching out for _him_.

* * *

After four hours of sleep (with Minion out of his gorilla-suit to make sure he actually _got_ some too and didn't sneak away to keep working after she was asleep) Roxanne discovered that breakfast at the lair was apparently a very efficient affair, thanks to Minions mastery of his kitchen.

Because it was _his_ kitchen, no doubt about it. It was fascinating to watch him swirl around to get everything he needed and how efficient he was. He even used his feet to get stuff from below the counter!

She looked around and admired the room while Minion cooked. She had been too tired to notice last night- well, more like 'this morning', really, but the space was beautiful.

The kitchen was smaller than she expected, in a huge warehouse with plenty of space, but it appeared Minion had it just as he wanted it. He was probably the one who designed it, after all.

It had been built into one of the smaller rooms just off the main hub (Minion called it 'the work room', but she'd gotten used to 'main hub'. That's what it looked like!) and it was just a little bit larger than her own at the apartment.

White-tiled floors, a slate-grey counter-top with mostly open shelves above and a single row of cupboards along the floor. The doors appeared black, but after a while Roxanne realized they were the same dark wood as the interior details of the invisible car!

The tiles on the walls were a beautiful sea-green that accented the counter-top perfectly and there were recessed lights in all the shelves and cupboards (including those without glass), so even with all the black it didn't seem dark, just sophisticated. The polished surfaces also helped to reflect the light and brighten up the space.

The oven looked like a state-of-the-art professional gas burner with brushed steel surfaces and Roxanne was surprised it appeared to be original, no apparent 'tweaking' by Megamind at all (not even a single spike). She didn't see any other freezer except the small one inside the fridge and the fridge placed in the corner was well-stocked.

It wasn't until Minion opened one of the cupboards under the counter that she saw signs of Megamind's influence on the kitchen. There were some chemistry-beakers and a bottle of a strange blue powder Roxanne doubted was healthy to eat. Other than that the room was all Minion.

In no time he had her breakfast ready. It was made up of fresh, brainbot-pressed orange juice, pancakes with syrup, topped with fresh blackberries, raspberries and currants and a strawberry-lime smoothie as 'desert'.

And of course lots of coffee.

By the time she was done it was almost ten in the morning and time to get back to work.

Work...

\- Oh shit, I have to make a call, I'll be right back, Minion!

She got up from her swiveling bar-chair and walked out of the kitchen and into the main hub. She was off today since it was Saturday, but she was supposed to come in tomorrow to do the Sunday special. It was still early but she wanted to give her boss a heads up as early as possible.

* * *

Minion busied himself with clearing the dishes (which took about three seconds, the time it took to order one of the kitchen-bots to do it, _properly_ this time, please!). Afterwards he tried to appear as if he wasn't there while Miss Ritchie was finishing her call.

He didn't _intend_ to listen, it just kind of... happened.

\- ...ey Benny, it's me. I just wanted to let you know I'm taking a week of my PTO, starting tomorrow. It might take longer but I'll let you know if it does. It's a family emergency.

Minion started and gave her a Look at that, even if she couldn't see it.

 _Family emergency?_

His attention turned back to Miss Ritchie's obviously annoyed tone.

\- Yeah, I _know_ that, but just let Jill take it, she can handle it. Hal will make it- What? No, this can't wait! I- yeah, well, I'm sure you'll make it work, this isn't up for discussion, I just called to let you know, I'm _using_ my PTO! I have a right to them and you just check and see when the last time I took a vacation day. Yeah, that's right. You- WHAT?!

She was yelling now, walking in circles in her socks on the bare concrete floor, right by the red curtain, and Minion was very happy that her red-hot anger wasn't directed at him.

Angry Miss Ritchie was deeply unsettling!

* * *

\- Yeah well, screw you, Benny.

Then she hung up and growled. It was at times like this she really missed the old phones where she could slam the speaker down properly. It just wasn't possible to hang up on someone rudely with cellphones! She stuffed her phone harshly into her pocket instead and huffed.

\- Miss Ritchie… what did you just do?

He looked so pensive and spoke so quietly Roxanne almost didn't hear Minion in her anger at her jackass boss.

After a few seconds she sighed and looked behind her at Minion, still standing in the kitchen doorway.

\- I just took a week off so we can find Megamind. And possibly I might have signed my resignation in the process.

The fish looked at her in shock.

\- You- you just said 'family emergency'. Miss Ritchie, I-

He looked at her like she had suddenly turned a certain shade of blue. He was sure he'd misunderstood. There were probably rules on when she could use the PTO-days. It probably only applied to close family and she had to lie to get them. But that meant she'd have fewer days if she got an _actual_ family emergency!

\- Minion, have you been eavesdropping?

She drew out the 'o' in his name, her tone teasing, not scolding. She just had to ask, and oh god was Minion's face worth it! She remembered to give him a smile that clearly said she was joking, but it didn't appear he caught it or her tone.

\- Miss Ritchie! I promise- I didn't- I-I-I didn't mean to- I- never-

He turned a dark green, his eyes huge as he frantically tried to explain and apologize all at once and fell over his own words, his hands making soothing motions to ward off an exploding Miss Ritchie.

\- Oh god, I'm sorry Minion, I know you didn't do it on purpose.

She suppressed a laugh and tried to assure him she _was_ , in fact, joking.

\- You may be my kidnappers but I've realized I've been thinking of you as my friends too, for a _long_ time. And friends _joke_ with each other, okay?

She came over to him and put her free hand on a faux fur robotic gorilla arm. He was still breathing hard (she thought, it was hard to tell through the glass) and looked a little extra green.

\- It's certainly the strangest, most fucked up friendship I've ever encountered, with the kidnappings and deathtraps and stuff, but still... We _are_ friends. Taking time off to help is the least I can do.

Minion didn't quite know what to say to that. Friends. They were _friends_! They had a human friend! And that friend was Miss Ritchie of all people! And she had just risked her _job_ to help him look for Sir! He couldn't _not_ hug her now, so he swept her up in his arms and squeezed until she rather frantically knocked on his glass to make him let her breathe again.

* * *

 **Four weeks earlier:**

Surprisingly it wasn't Scarface who moved first after Megamind's confident challenge, but one of the two he hadn't met before, the one next to Scarface. He came at Megamind fast but obviously inexperienced, something small and shiny in his left hand.

Megamind recognized it as a knife and subconsciously moved fluidly into position in an instant.

He wasn't sure what Leftie though he'd accomplish with something looking like a pocket-knife, but he nimbly sidestepped anyway, while grabbing the knife-hand with his right, spinning to increase momentum, his cape fanning out behind him, and bringing his left elbow down hard on the neck of his 'opponent'.

Megamind sent Leftie flying forward and crashing to the wet ground in a crumbled heap, staying there, the knife (a pitiful excuse of a knife) now in Megamind's hand. It was over in less than two seconds.

 _Evil heavens, it really_ is _a pocketknife!_

Megamind looked down at the "knife" in his hand with disgust, at the red casing with the little insignia of the Swiss Armed Forces on one side, looking worn and scuffed. The blade itself was scratched and showed the evidence of being sharpened in a less-that-professional way many times.

 _Leathcheann! It's not even sharp!_

He looked up at the four left standing with an incredulous expression.

\- Did he-

Megamind gestured to the crumbled Leftie on the asphalt in a very 'please-tell-me-you're-joking' kind of way.

\- -just _seriously_ come at me with a _Swiss army knife_?!

He almost roared the last part, looking around his present company, deeply offended.

No answer seemed forthcoming though.

\- All right, anyone else?

Megamind derisively threw the little 'knife' away and it clattered into a drain. He straightened up, squaring his shoulders. Megamind was done waiting and now he wanted to get on with it. He was angry and sought to let out some steam. He wanted to _punch_ something! He gave each thug a challenging glare.

* * *

 **Leathcheann means 'idiot' in irish.**

 **And I have no idea how PTO-days work or how many you get, so let's just pretend this is how it works in Metro City (I almost wrote Metrocity...). If anyone have any suggestions as to how their investigation should go, or ideas for what they find/do/anything else, I'd love to hear about it, investigations are really not my thing!**

 **And as before, I'll probably come back and change details since I'm picky ;-)**


	5. Could it be a breakthrough?

**First of all: thank you for all the comments, suggestions and critics! I love it when I get a review-alert :-). Also, if anyone has any ideas to how the investigation could progress (or anything else) I'm completely up for suggestions :-D**

 **And: any resemblance to characters living or created is completely coincidental. Also, I don't own Megamind...**

* * *

By ten thirty Saturday morning Roxanne and Minion was back in the surveillance room. Minion was sitting in his spiky chair after having watered the blue daisy, still placed on the control panel, while Roxanne had been occupying a regular office chair, black of course, but otherwise non-evil-looking. Right now, though, she was pacing while intermittently looking at a picture displayed on one of the monitors.

Roxanne was looking at yet another image from the night Megamind disappeared. She felt like she was intimately familiar with every single brick and crack on that street by now and on first-name basis with the weed. This picture was one of an overview of where Minion had said Megamind was doing some 'field work', not far from where he'd found the trashcan-cube. She understood he still wasn't comfortable telling her specifics about their operation, but this could be important for her to know.

She had been going over footage from all over the city taken the day Megamind disappeared, and Minion was now working on redirecting the brainbot-patrols to new tasks and areas.

He had already determined that the tire track was left two weeks after the disappearance and not significant for their search, the glass had been analyzed (with worrying results) and now they were making a timeline of the last day Megamind's whereabouts were known.

Mapping most of the day had been easy; Megamind had battled Metro Man in his newest robot equipped with a contraption that could heat anything to superheated plasma (including invincible heroes according to Megamind's own calculations).

Unfortunately it had misfired due to inferior materials in the combustion chamber and the hero had handed Megamind over to an (inept) police officer few minutes later.

Seconds after being taken into custody, while Metro Man was being interviewed, blue smoke erupted and twenty Megaminds flew away, carried by brainbots in all directions, and Metro Man hadn't picked the right one to pursue.

Minion and a pack of brainbots had met Sir at the entrance of Evil Lair, ready with a stack of home-made doughnuts with jelly, cream and sprinkles and Megamind had eaten about half of them while still walking down the hallway, complimenting Minion on his excellent cooking-skills.

Then he'd gone to change into a new cape and suit, since that ridiculously strong hero had torn the suit and the cape had snagged on a spike when Megamind was lifted from the wreckage of the robot.

After that both Megamind and Minion had played 'fetch-the-wrench' with the brainbots for at least two hours, according to Minion's estimates, and then Megamind had gone to check on the tip-board set up like a chat-site on the internet.

(Their informants had pre-determined user-names assigned by Megamind so he knew who to pay and who was actually just some random citizen, especially since the key-words were often used in discussions all over the net. The informants knew the words to relay information of unfaithful servants, intel on other supervillains and heroes and everything else Megamind needed to know about his empire).

Occasionally tippers would approach them with information that wasn't covered by the key-words. They would be paid a bonus and a new word would be added to the Dictionary of Evil Information.

This time there had been a new post talking about the effects of climate change on the Great Lakes and the consequences it could have on the migration of a rare species of bird.

The words 'climate change' meant that something was going on that wasn't supposed to. Mentioning the Great Lakes together with climate change spoke of people dealing directly with Megamind who were doing something they shouldn't and the 'migration of rare birds' was code for anyone dealing with import/export of sensitive equipment. If it had been regular import/export the 'birds' wouldn't be 'rare'.

Megamind had known who the tip was about instantly and decided to go check on it before dinner. He had already suspected something, but hadn't gotten around to fix it yet.

By then it was already somewhat late, but he had told Minion to have dinner ready anyway, 'make something extra good, we need to celebrate!'. He'd taken the invisible car and that was the last time Minion had seen him.

After that the timeline got a bit uncertain. There were occasional footage of the car from a roaming brainbot (using infrared overlaid the visible spectrum of light), and that last communication from Megamind himself saying he'd see Minion in fifteen minutes.

It was clear that whatever happened occurred in the minutes between Megamind's last communique and when he should have been back. Fifteen minutes wasn't much, but apparently enough to make a supergenius disappear almost without a trace.

They had to be careful to not add anything they didn't have actual proof of to the timeline so that it didn't influence anything they did later, but it was hard not to assume. She had wanted to add that he got to the car, for sure, and Minion was hard pressed to not add 'got another tip', but when they didn't have proof they couldn't add anything no matter what they 'were certain of'.

Roxanne dumped down into her chair again, let her arms hang down and leaned her head back, looking up into the ceiling where power-cords, fiber-optics and wires criss-crossed like a spider's web. It was clear that all the monitors had been added more or less one by one, resulting in no system or order to the cables, much like the seemingly chaotic idea-cloud, but she was sure Megamind knew exactly where to find what and that there were some kind of system to it. You just needed to be an alien supergenius to see it.

She felt exhausted and like she was trying to walk through a wall...

 _I need a break._

* * *

Roxanne went back to the hub from the surveillance room and just picked a random direction. She needed to clear her mind and din't care much where she went right now. She passed the theater curtain that hid what she'd come to think of as the secret center of the lair, a warm bright place, hidden inside a dark, unforgiving shell of evil.

She walked down a so-far unknown hallway, this one pretty well lit with some kind of glow-in-the-dark paint on the ceiling and walls, with the floor just the regular grey concrete and the occasional grating, presumably for ventilation. The paint emitted a bright white light, not that faint 'it glows if you squint' thing you got in a toy store, and it seemed to brighten as she moved down the hallway.

 _Motion activated paint?_

The brainbot that had started following her everywhere came flying from behind with a mug of fresh coffee, making her jump just as she was poking at an arm of one of Megamind's old robot-suits.

The bot was one of the few she'd seen with pink markings (the only one, really). She hadn't even realized she'd asked it for a coffee; it was surprising how fast she'd become comfortable in the lair and with the brainbots. She was actually giving them orders now without ever realizing! Granted 'get me a coffee' wasn't much of an order, but still. Why did they even listen to her at all?

A tinking sound turned her attention back to the robot arm. It was the brainbot tapping it with one of it's claws, then drifting off to hang in the air a few feet behind her, apparently bored but with nothing else to do. Or was it waiting for her next order?

The robotic arm was about ten feet long, black of course, with some blue pinstriping, the paint scuffed, and a row of broken spikes on the 'forearm', just lying by the wall, apparently discarded and waiting to be repurposed.

The hand was frozen in what looked like an 'evil claw' sort of position, like he'd been doing one of his 'hahaha, today I will triumph and rule this city'-poses just when the arm froze or whatever happened. He had too many 'evil robot'-suits for Roxanne to keep track of them all so she couldn't pinpoint which kidnapping this arm belonged to.

She started walking again, passing what appeared to be broken, half-finished and discontinued inventions. Here and there along the walls were some equations, a few graphs and a half-finished sketch of some unknown invention along with the face of a laughing Minion. He seemed to always sketch Minion when he was inventing, just like on the blueprints in the curtain-room.

It looked like Megamind would suddenly get an idea on his way somewhere and just scribble it wherever he was if he didn't have paper on hand. She smiled as she traced the exponential curve of a graph with her fingers, the end of the curve evolving into another picture of Minion, imagining how his eyes lit up with a new idea, like they sometimes did when he had kidnapped her and they were bantering (but not quite the same way, somehow), and how he'd look around for some paper, but not finding any, so he'd just write on the wall, leaning on one hand, head cocked to the side and his tongue sticking out like a kid.

Megamind was such a geek!

She wondered about the contrasts she'd seen. The bright idea-place versus the dark storage-areas, the dangerous-looking brainbots with spikes and teeth behaving like puppies and bringing her coffee, a supervillain cooing over his creations like they were his babies and playing with them (when he thought she wasn't looking)...

Everything supported her impression that Megamind wasn't really evil. He certainly _tried_ to be, but there were too many little incidents for her to believe he was truly _Evil_.

Like when he'd canceled mid-kidnapping because a brainbot had been brought back severely damaged. Or that time when he'd taken a shot from Metro Man because his aim was off and the laser would have hit Minion's suit, possibly even his bowl. Or that time he'd not only let her out of a kidnapping because her mother had been taken to the hospital with a broken hip, but driven her there himself (with a blindfold, but still. There had even been a bouquet of blue roses in her mother's room the next day, and one with lavender roses for her waiting by the door when she got home).

Or one of the dozens of other times he'd done something that screamed 'not really evil' if you just bothered to listen.

To her it was obvious he wasn't evil, or 'bad', or even wicked. So why did he pretend to be? Did he find it fun? He looked like he was having a blast most of the time, but often she'd catch a look on his face, usually when Metro Man came to rescue her or when they were bantering and she got a particular jab in about him being bad. She wasn't sure what the look was, but it certainly wasn't 'happy'.

Other times when they thought she was still unconscious his voice sounded… resigned, when he talked with Minion waiting for her to wake up. Like it was just a job to him, one he didn't like but had to do, but as soon as they noticed she was awake he'd be back to his old cackling, 'evil' self. But was that really 'himself'?

She couldn't make herself believe Megamind was happy being a villain. He put on a good show, sure, and was the expert on how to wear a mask (she knew all about masks, she was a reporter after all), but there was always something missing for her to believe he was _happy_. The only times he looked close to content was when they were bantering, before the cameras were turned on, when it was just him and her. They bordered on flirting even, and he had even given her a genuine smile a few times! But as soon as the city was watching it was like there was a wall behind his eyes and she could never get him to feel real as long as the public was looking.

She kept wandering while contemplating the paradox of Megamind and didn't really pay attention to her surrounding until she suddenly found herself in a dark corridor. There were no glowing paint and the walls were bare brick, no scribbles on them anywhere. The floor was empty of anything resembling inventions but she saw a box with a heap of clothes in a corner, but upon closer inspection it was discarded cut-offs, probably from Minion's tailoring.

There was a door to the left down the hall, the only door in this hallway, and she was drawn to it. It was a plain wooden door, no embellishments of any kind and nothing to indicate what was behind it.

 _Probably just another storage room._

It was unlocked so she opened it, expecting sleeping brainbots or shelves of inventions. What she got instead was-

 _Bedroom..._

Megamind's bedroom.

The hallway was dark and there were no light sources in the room that she could see, making it gloomy, but she could glimpse the corner of a bed, a cluttered desk with a chair next to it and an overstuffed bookshelf. The floor was unsurprisingly concrete, like the rest of the lair, but she wondered why he hadn't even put in a rug. The bed seemed to have black covers and behind the clutter on the desk she could glimpse a picture frame but not the picture itself.

Her foot started to move across the doorstep, but stopped mid-air like it had met an invisible wall. She couldn't- she didn't want to violate his- well, not trust, he didn't trust her- but his privacy, like this, no matter how curious she was. It already felt like she was intruding, just knowing where his room _was_ , not to mention if she went snooping around inside! Everybody had a right to privacy, even him.

Maybe especially him.

She hesitated. Would it hurt with just a quick peek around? Not opening anything, just a quick peek, maybe find a light switch... She was _dying_ to know what was in the picture at least.

She wasn't about to make an exposè about his sleeping habits, but oh, she could learn so _much_ about him in there, she was sure, even if it would be just for her own knowledge. A place where he was himself! And she wanted to know. She wanted to know _him_ , not just the evil persona he showed to the public. She wanted to know the man he'd sometimes reveal when he forgot himself, before the cameras were rolling, the one that seemed like a genuinely good, sweet guy. But if he ever found out she'd gone snooping in his bedroom he'd never ever come to trust her, no matter what she did and most certainly not tell her anything about himself.

She forced herself to take a step back and closed the door. Then she turned around and had to lean against it while rubbing her face, groaning in frustration and knocking her head back at the door, the sound echoing down the corridor.

 _What the hell am I doing?_

That room could be a treasure trove of information! But if the price was loosing his trust before she even got it, and Minion's too probably, she couldn't risk it.

She had to concentrate on the search, _finding_ him, not go poking into his private things.

With a huff she pushed herself away from the door and turned around to get a last look at it, placing her palm flat on the wooden surface. Her hand was drawn down to the doorknob, but she resisted the urge to fling the door open and go over every inch of his room.

In stead she turned around and headed back the way she'd come with determination.

She still wasn't sure where she was but she had a good sense of direction, and the pink brainbot was floating in front of her now, looking back over it's dome like it was checking if she was coming. Deciding she might as well follow it, it lead her out of the dark and into another well-lit hallway.

More of the glow-in-the-dark paint, more scribbles covered the walls and inventions started to litter the floor again, but she was too preoccupied with her own thoughts about the bedroom she didn't even see the small sketch of herself, laughing, just on the corner to her right before the hallway split in two in a Y-intersection.

Heading to the left the brainbot floated into a circular room and then vanished.

In the center was what looked like a huge microscope, only without lenses, and it looked like it was supposed to revolve. She circled it, trying to work out what it was, but like most of his inventions it was beyond her. The room was illuminated with a warm yellow light but apart from the mega-microscope it was empty, so she exited directly across from where she'd entered and was surprised when she found herself back in the main hub.

She felt like she should be back already, it felt like she'd wandered around for hours!

She crossed the expanse and went into the curtained-off idea-room, hoping that would lighten her mood. After a little circuit around, looking at more sketches of Minion and a few she found of Megamind himself (usually in a victorious pose), she ended in a rolling chair in the middle of the room, staring at the blackboards with the long equation but not really seeing it, her mind getting lost in her thoughts about the missing blue alien.

* * *

After what seemed like minutes but could possibly be hours spinning around in the chair, Roxanne heard an alarm going off somewhere in the lair, very similar to her own alarm clock.

 _Oh, right. Food._

They had set an alarm to go off at around lunch- and dinner-time, so they didn't forget to eat. Still she stayed in the chair, staring at the equation. Somehow the incomprehensible scribbles helped clear her mind. Helped put things in order and lessen the chaos.

Minion's heavy footsteps echoed in the lair and she heard a rustle when he looked in to find her sitting in what she just now realized was one of Megamind's high-backed black leather-chairs.

\- Miss Ritchi? Are you up for some lunch?

\- Dinner bell...

She turned the chair around so she was facing Minion and the pink brainbot hovering behind him and gave them a smile that didn't reach her eyes.

\- Hehe, yeah. Good idea by the way, or I guess we'd starve before we found Sir.

\- We both get kind of- preoccupied I guess.

\- I suppose.

Minion smiled warmly at her.

\- How does grilled brie and tomato sandwiches sound?

Roxanne used her feet to swivel the chair around again so she could kick with her feet and send herself rolling towards Minion. She understood why the wheely-chair was Megamind's favorite transportation during kidnappings, she'd forgotten how fun it was to send herself rattling over a not-entirely-smooth floor!

She'd have to do this more often!

\- That sounds amazing!

She jumped out of the chair and walked past him towards the kitchen. She hadn't realized how hungry she was until he mentioned food. And those sandwiches sounded wonderful! Minion was really a great cook, she rarely got that good food even on expensive restaurants!

\- You coming?

Minion had to take a few deep breaths before having a chance to move, and if it hadn't been for his robotic body he would have had to hold on to the curtain to not fall over. That had been entirely too much like Sir, with the spinning and the rolling and even the getting out of the chair! All that was missing was a cape...

Eventually he got himself under control and lumbered after Miss Ritchi to the kitchen to fix them lunch, his mind still a bit chaotic his crests glowing slightly.

* * *

Twenty minutes after Minion found her in the idea-room a delicious smell was coming from the kitchen. Roxanne was perched on her usual spot on the outside of the island-bar, twiddling another blue daisy she hadn't seen the first time she was in this seat. Minion has just taking pieces of toast out of the oven, filling the room with the smell of Mediterranean cooking. He put her toasts on a plate that matched the sea-green tiles of the kitchen and placed a glass of iced tea next to it.

While Roxanne ate at her spot Minion put his own on a cutting board and cut his toast into mouthfuls with the chef's knife. Opening his bowl he used his arms to hold pieces of toast over the water so that he could swim up to grab them with his mouth.

He liked bread but hated when it got soggy, so he tried to keep it out of the water.

They ate in silence and Roxanne's thoughts went back to Megamind and how he-

\- Minion?

She put her toast down and looked over at him. He'd frozen with his hand over his bowl, still a piece of toast in his fingers and his nose just barely poking out of the water ready to take a bite. He turned away from his food and looked at her expectantly.

\- Is Megamind happy being a villain?

If Minion had been chewing he'd choked on his food.

 _Where did_ that _come from?_

His face must have conveyed his confusion because thank evil heaven Miss Ritchi explained.

\- It's just that, I was walking around the lair and I- kind of found his bedroom. I didn't go inside! I promise.

She had to reassure him when he got _that_ face.

\- But I started thinking, even before I found his room- actually before he even went missing, I- There's been little- incidents, looks mostly- that got me thinking. He doesn't really seem happy with being the bad guy. Not really. Not _happy-_ happy. So I was just wondering...

Roxanne was suddenly worried she'd inadvertently broken Minion. He had seized up completely, his eyes so large she was surprised they didn't fall out, his jaw hanging open and she couldn't even see him breathing.

\- Um... Minion?

She got out of her chair and meant to come around to his side when he suddenly sputtered to life again.

\- Miss Ritchi... How did you...? How... long have you known?

His voice was barely a whisper and he looked like he was about to faint.

\- It's a suspicion. I've had. For a long time I guess. I just didn't realize before now. He really doesn't seem like he wants to be the bad guy. I've- heard him sometimes, when you guys were talking. You thought I was still knocked out and he's just sounded so... sad.

\- I-

A silence of several seconds stretched and Minion felt himself blush a bit. He remembered some of the things they'd talked about while waiting for Miss Ritchi to wake up, and he hoped she'd missed a few specific subjects.

\- You're right. He's not.

Minion got a sad and rather dark look on his face and he looked away from her, his voice turning bitter.

\- He _never_ wanted to be, but he's convinced he doesn't have a choice, that it's his destiny. And nobody ever even gave him a _chance_ to be anything else, so that didn't exactly help either. They take one look at him and label him as 'bad' and- after years of trying I guess he just gave up... Decided to just give them what _they_ obviously wanted, in stead of what _he_ wanted. I tried to change his mind for- for _years_ \- but he's really quite stubborn, you've probably noticed.

He gave her a crooked smile at that last part. Oh yes, she knew how stubborn Megamind could be. When he decided to do something it was easier to turn a rock into a butterfly by asking it nicely than change his mind once it was set.

'Stubborn' didn't even begin to cover it.

\- The only one apart from Warden who's _ever_ given him the benefit of the doubt is you, Miss Ritchi. I don't know if you've noticed, he tries to hide it, but it's been a long time since defeating Metro Man was the purpose of his kidnapping you.

She could see Minion blushing at that. Megamind would probably throw a fit if he heard his minion telling their victim all this and she made a vow to never out Minion unless he said it was okay.

\- Thank you for telling me, I really appreciate it.

So she was right. He'd never been happy being the bad guy. But how could she fix it?

Apparently he was- interested. But was it just because she posed a challenge, an intellectual challenge, with not screaming, or was he interested in- other things? And why didn't that scare her?

Because this was Megamind, she decided. She'd never been scared of him.

Was it even possible? Could he be turned to good? The guy had 57 life sentences for god's sake! Those didn't just go away even if he decided to quit villainy. If what Minion had told her was true (and why wouldn't it be?) he _never_ wanted to be bad, he just thought he didn't have a choice, and so he did his best at what he thought he had to be.

Maybe she could make a deal with the governor? She had contacts all over the city, would it be possible to negotiate a pardon? Perhaps in return for some of his inventions or patents (he was bound to have patented some of his stuff, right?). If she got Metro Man to go along the public was more likely to support- they should hold a press conference first, and then she could set up a meeting with the mayor for both herself and Megamind, maybe even Metro Man? The mayor was less likely to faint from fear if the hero was present, and then-

She closed her eyes and refocused. Then she looked back at Minion who still had traces of that anger on his face, but now looked mostly curious. How long had she been in her own little world where supervillains got pardoned and possibly stole the girl from the hero?

She frowned and looked down at her toast. Good or bad, pardons and press conferences, that was subjects for later. First they had to actually _find_ him!

They had to get back to business.

\- Minion, can I ask what he was doing there?

If the mood had been lighter Roxanne would have laughed at how fast Minion's face changed. She hoped she hadn't given him a mental whip-lash, but he recovered quickly.

\- Oh! Um, well. Sir was- persuading one of our- 'employees' to-

Roxanne saw him struggle. He looked down at the floor, over to the fridge, down at his hands, obviously uncertain what he should do.

When he looked over at the daisy she saw his little fish-face turn determined and he looked back at her straight in the eyes.

\- Okay, Frank was skimming off of what he pays us, we take a cut of his income, you see, for letting him continue his business in Sir's territory, and Sir went to make him stop. He's apparently been embezzling for several months so Sir went to warn him if he didn't clean up his act and pay back what he stole we would either run him out of town or feed him to the alligators.

By the time Minion finished talking Roxanne's world started to slow down from that stomach-turning spiral-plunge it had started on. She hadn't heard much beyond-

 _Frank..._

* * *

Suddenly she was back in the little cafe, talking to Johnny, one of her informants.

He was the tall and gangly type, dark hair and dressed like a doc-worker with worn jeans, a checkered shirt and a once-red down jacket.

They were sipping coffee in a well-worn booth all the way in the back of the small cafè, his treat. He had taken a regular black coffee but Roxanne had opted for a cappuccino. She hadn't regretted it, the coffee in this place was amazing!

He had just told her about a human trafficing ring, recently started in the Dockside area, actually not far from here, and focusing on young girls. They were supposedly working out of an old mechanic's shop, keeping the girls there for a few days before moving them to another house.

Johnny trusted her now, ever since Roxanne had refused to give him up as the source after the police had gotten a nice drug-bust based on her tip. They had pressured her but Roxanne had stood firm on the reporter's privilege to protect her informant. She assured him she would look into the trafficking and leave a tip for the police while keeping his identity a secret.

When they were done with their coffee Johnny had started behaving strange, very jittery and looking around for anyone listening while seemingly trying to decide something. At last he'd leaned down low over the scratchy table, gesturing for her to do the same, like they were two teenagers sharing a secret, almost invisible to everyone in the room.

When he was certain they weren't overheard he'd told her in a whisper that someone was after the blue alien, _really_ after him. He didn't know who but it had sounded serious.

\- I don't know when it's going down or who's giving the orders, but someone named Frank is in on it somehow. No last name, didn't catch that, I had to get out before the spotted me, but it started with a "W". Tell him the next time you see him. He should watch his back.

Right after that Johnny had gotten up and all but run out of the cafe, all the while looking around as if for someone coming for him.

His departure was disconcerting, Roxanne hadn't seen him for months after that meeting and had been worried that someone had gotten to him. After four months, though, she'd spotted him across the street, seemingly okay. But he hadn't contacted her again with any more tips, after the last meeting.

* * *

When her thoughts came crashing back to the present Roxanne had fallen on her ass if she hadn't already been sitting.

She _had_ told Megamind, _many_ times after she got the tip, but he'd laughed it away every single time, saying 'someone is always after me, they want me for my incredible handsomeness' and gone about his business of trying to destroy Metro Man.

And he was right, there _were_ always someone after him, apart from the law and Metro Man. Other villains, occasionally other heroes, the Doom Syndicate, but no-one ever got close to the Master of all Villainy.

The things Johnny had said, though, how he'd said it- it hadn't seemed like an 'oh not this again'-kind of thing.

But, after almost a year with nothing happening, no indication there were anyone coming for Megamind (other than the usual lot), no new hero, no villain trying to take over, no government helicopters going bump in the night, even Roxanne had started to dismiss it as just more exaggerated rumors.

But there had always been a tiny grain of uncertainty, and now...

– Frank... who?

She managed to choke out the question.

– Miss Ritchie? Are... you okay?

– Who, Minion?

– Uh, Whilkins. Frank Whilkins. With an 'h'. Why?

Miss Ritchi curled over her knees and pressed her hands to her face, groaning, while Minion could hear her muttering something that included 'idiot', 'moron' and a longer string of profanities than he'd ever heard, even from Sir (at least in English), but it seemed to be directed at herself for some reason.

– Oh god, Minion I'm so sorry!

She jumped out of the chair and started walking in small circles, her shoes making a faint tapping sound on the tiled kitchen floor. She fisted her hands in her short hair and looked generally pissed of at something.

Minion hoped it wasn't him, but this was a little confusing.

– Miss Ritchie, what- what's the matter? Why would you be- sorry?

– Why didn't I say anything?! I mean- I did, but he never listened! God damn, that stupid, stubborn idiot! How can he be so smart and so _stupid_!?

Minion was alarmed and now a little annoyed. Not even Miss Ritchi was allowed to call his Sir an idiot!

He came around from behind the kitchen-bar and grabbed her shoulders (gently) to stop her, trying to make her focus on him. He knew of course she didn't think Sir was an idiot, but he always bristled when anyone called him names. They had both gotten enough of that in school.

Miss Ritchi was still rambling as he held her and what the hell should he do with her?! Minion wasn't used to semi-hysterical women, especially not semi-hysterical Miss Ritchi!

She looked up at him and then Minion almost had to go hide in the basement because there were _tears_ in Miss Ritchi's eyes! That was _not_ supposed to happen! Thank evil heaven she wasn't actually crying, just glassy-eyed, but that's more than enough for him to deal with, thank you very much!

– God... Minion, this is all my fault! If I had just made him listen, if I'd just- _convinced_ him, he- I...

– Miss Ritchi!

Minion almost had to yell her name to get her attention.

– _What_ are you talking about? How can this be your fault? Miss Ritchi, please calm down!

He was begging her and it was incredible how he could _see_ her calm herself down. She took a deep breath and held it for several seconds, closed her eyes. He could feel through the bio-sensors built into his suit how she relaxed her shoulders, and when she opened her eyes and looked at him again she was back to her old, confident self, just a little rough around the edges.

– Sorry about that...

She turned a little red and gave him an embarrassed smile before she looked away, brushing some stray hair behind her ear.

– Could you- could you tell me what happened?

Minion pulled back and tapped his fingers together in a slightly nervous way, like he always did when Sir did something unnecessarily dangerous.

He had to know, Miss Ritchi never freaked out for no reason. She rarely freaked out _with_ a reason!

– Yeah, of course, Minion. I just- Okay, remember about eighteen months ago, when I tried to tell Megamind someone was looking for him?

Minion just nodded, he didn't want to interrupt her. In stead he went to make some herbal tea while Miss Ritchi talked.

– Well, one of my contacts, I guess he felt he owed me a favor, he tipped me that someone was looking for your boss, seriously, _really_ coming after him. He had only one name; Frank. He wasn't sure about the last name, said it could be Willard, but he was sure it started with a 'w', and that he stayed in the warehouse district, dealing with import and export.

She went back over to her chair by the island and sat down. Or rather fell down into it.

– When we arrived earlier tonight I got this- this feeling that the area was significant. I just remembered the coffee shop, that's where I met up with Johnny the last time. God, I should have... Why didn't I see it?!

Minion did remember her telling Sir about someone looking for him. He actually thought she'd used the words 'coming for him', and Miss Ritchi had been really adamant that it was no joke. In the weeks after he'd tried to make Sir take her seriously, for all they knew it could be the government giving it another try, but Sir had told him to stop being such a momma-fish and in the end actually _ordered_ his minion to Leave. It.

So Minion had stopped the obvious attempts and settled for keeping a closer eye on Megamind, always sending a brainbot with him, 'just in case', going so far as to almost never letting him leave Evil Lair alone, always finding an excuse to come with him. He also had a brainbot constantly supervising Frank, but after over a year the brainbot had been redirected for an emergency and hadn't been re-posted to Frank after that.

He suspected Sir knew what he'd been doing, but didn't say anything.

As the months went by and no attempt was made Minion had let his guard down too to it's usual sky-high place (usually it was in the stratosphere but during that year it had been rivaling Pluto) and they started living like normal again.

 _How could I be so stupid?_

Minion had already interrogated Frank, the same day Sir went missing, but this put everything in a new light. Now there were a whole other type of questions to ask. Just one, really.

He looked levelly at Miss Ritchi, seeing she was still a tiny bit shattery but mostly back to her own self.

– We need to talk to Frank again.

Minion stalked out of the kitchen with Roxanne right behind him.

– Kyle! Get the others and meet at the car!

He went to a desk and got something Roxanne didn't catch what was, and then they ran for the invisible car.

Four brainbots were hovering over the hood, waiting for the bipeds. They flew ahead of Minion into the car, getting into the back and started squabbling over who got the window seats as the car screeched out of the secret entrance.

* * *

 **Four weeks earlier:**

Finally they made a move, Scarface from the right, cracking his knuckles, and Jerry from the left, and Megamind's internal clock started ticking.

The rain was pouring by now and the single lightbulb was making the shadows appear darker than they were. It was the perfect weather to be evil in!

00:01:00

Scarface was slightly faster and closer than Jerry as he came at Megamind with a raised fist, the one with the brass knuckles.

Megamind had grown up always being the smallest of two opponents, so he knew exactly how to turn his adversary's strength and weight against themselves. He might look like a stick-figure but he was a lot stronger than anyone ever anticipated.

He grinned as he blocked the first punch aimed for his head easily, the spikes on his gloves giving the thug an extra prize for being stupid and making him yell. Megamind twisted around with a firm grip on the brass-arm, crouched down to put his spiked shoulder in his opponent's midsection and with a grunt sent Scarface flying, barreling straight into Jerry.

They tumbled to the ground in a four-armed heap after making friendly with a full dumpster just inside the alley. They wouldn't stay down long, but long enough for him to permanently take down one or maybe two of the others.

He had to figure something out, suit-wise, for rainy days like this. That throw would have looked _magnificent_ with his cape flaring out behind him, shiny with rain, drops of water sparkling in the dim light like precious stones! But instead it was soaking and heavy with the rain and stuck to his legs in a really uncomfortable and not at all villainous way. It didn't even swish a tiny bit! How was he supposed to properly intimidate his subjects if he looked like a drowned cat?!

 _I could probably adapt the spray I use to waterproof the electronics of the brainbots to use on fabric._

00:03:04

The last unknown thug circled slowly in a wide arch around his back.

Phil in front drew another knife, a proper one this time, fina- _fucking_ -ly, with a serrated edge, the black blade about ten inches long and a smooth curve to the cutting edge ending in a vicious-looking point. The back of the blade had notches and the guard looked solid. It was a knife belonging to a man who knew how to take care of it.

That thing could do some serious damage when used properly, and Phil looked like he knew how to handle it.

Too bad it wouldn't help him any. Armed fist-fights weren't exactly unfamiliar territory.

Megamind stepped up close to Phil, quick as a snake, right up in his face and so close Megamind could smell his aftershave (a sickly sweet one, yish).

Before Phil had a chance to recover from the surprising move of his opponent or even take a step back, the alien was staring him down and had his hand wrapped around his wrist like a vice, twisting it so hard Phil had no choice but to drop the knife unless he wanted shattered bones. Megamind noticed where the knife landed and kicked it away to join that sorry excuse of a pocket knife in the drain.

Then he kept on twisting, eliciting a pained yell from Phil who stood bent almost double backwards, grasping for Megamind's spiked arm and frantically trying to get his trapped wrist back, only ending up with a bleeding hand.

Megamind could feel how things snapped in his opponent's wrist as he kept lowering his arm. It gave him the creeps and he had to concentrate not to let go of that hand and go 'ew ew ew!'. That was _not_ something he felt like doing again!

Phil could make it stop any time if he'd just let himself fall over, but the idiot insisted on trying to get up. Megamind didn't have time for this so with one final twist and a concealed grimace of disgust Phil screamed and was on his back in a puddle, cradling the broken body part. Megamind finished it with a vicious kick to his temple and suddenly the wrist didn't seem to bother Phil anymore.

00:07:72

Two permanently out for the count, a bit too long for his taste, but then, he wasn't exactly in a hurry, he was still letting out steam.

Scarface was up again as expected, with a dazed Jerry behind him and the one Megamind didn't know finally closing in on him from behind.

He glared at the two in front, letting number three get close. Scarface looked like a thundercloud, he was that angry. Jerry looked like he was going to be sick or pee his pants. Or both.

He could also see the anticipation on the two faces, they were thinking he wasn't aware of what was going on behind his back, probably thinking they were keeping his attention on them. Apparently they didn't know his head was big for a _reason_! Multitasking was instinctive to him, so keeping track of multiple opponents was easy.

They were just as wet and soggy as himself, Scarface's leather jacket looked like it weighed a ton and Jerry looked like a rat that just crawled out of the sewer.

Picking the exact right moment, just when he heard a foot step down in the puddle behind him, Megamind threw his head back, connecting perfectly with the nose of number three. He went down to his knees and Megamind gave him a swift kick with a heel, straight in the family jewels. He started off with a holler, but the kick transformed it to a pained squeak as Unknown collapsed and started writhing on the ground. He wasn't getting up any time soon.

00:12:56

Three down, two to go.

– What? You thought this was gonna be easy?

Megamind let the mocking contempt bleed into his voice, giving them a sneer. Only Scarface and Jerry was left standing.

– Jerry, get the thing from Phil. Left jacket pocket.

 _Thing? What thing?_

Megamind didn't like the look Scarface gave him. There was something… _something_ there.

– It's a little gift...

He took a step closer, nervousness suddenly evaporated like it was never there, staring at Megamind with a nasty smile, as if he knew he had won. As if the roles had suddenly switched and Megamind had turned into the prey without ever getting the memo.

– ...from an old friend of yours. Remember doctor Neerim?

And just like that every drop of blood in Megamind's slender frame instantly turned to liquid nitrogen.

 _Oh no…_

The sudden mention of the old doctor's name momentarily stunned him while a flash of memories ran through his head. Unconsciously he took a step back from both of them, eyes wide and had to struggle to swallow that boulder that had suddenly taken up residence in his throat, almost stepping on the one he'd kicked in the nuts.

That fraction of a second distraction was enough for Scarface to take two leaping steps and wrap his arms around the blue alien.

Two thick arms suddenly clamping down around him snapped Megamind violently back to reality.

 _No no no!_

He was lifted off the ground and couldn't help a startled yell from escaping and kick out in an instinctive attempt to get loose, gritting his teeth while fighting down that old terror that came creeping.

This was the _one_ thing he couldn't let happen! Megamind knew he was strong, but against Scarface they were equally matched, and being in what was basically a headlock against this guy was _Not Good_! Megamind tried to loosen the grip, but those tree-trunk-like arms were't budging and he didn't have _any_ leverage when his upper arms were pinned down along his body like they were now and one arm was alarmingly tight over his throat.

He couldn't move anything but his legs and Jerry was getting up from rummaging around in Phil's jacket. The panic that had suddenly taken up residence in his stomach was coiling like a nest of snakes and spreading to the rest of his body.

The mention of doctor Neerim had been like a barrel of ice-water dumped on his head and now he had trouble thinking rationally!

He saw Jerry coming towards him with something that looked like a smooth metal cigar-case.

Megamind couldn't help but be curious about what it was, despite the panicky terror roiling around inside him. He tried to keep his expression neutral but he knew his nerves were showing.

Doc was the one and only human Megamind was actually _afraid_ of, but he was supposed to be _dead_! Hearing that name after so many years...

Scarface held him tight across the neck but he now had a tiny bit of room across his chest.

Jerry came closer and Megamind could both see and smell the fear coming off the little sewer rat.

Megamind jerked, like he was coming for Jerry. He just couldn't help it, even if it hurt his neck a little. Their reactions were just so _funny,_ even now in what could very possibly be a life or death situation! Jerry's jump made him grin. It helped a little against that powerless feeling he was starting to notice.

 _Hah!_

Even held down by a guy three times his size Megamind knew both his looks and reputation would keep humans wary of him (well, most of them, anyway. Certain reporters were... different). He'd escaped from so many different and crazy situations that nobody took much comfort in him being physically restrained in any way.

\- Oh for fuck's sake!

Scarface grumbled, Megamind laughed, and it didn't even sound forced! Not very impressed by his partner in idiocy, apparently, Scarface tightened his grip.

Megamind grinned at Jerry with a look of the offspring of a semi-mad scientist and a vampire bat.

\- I'm looking forward to seeing you tied up in my basement.

Megamind gave him Evil grin # 5 and kept his voice to a low growl with a seductive undertone. Even Minion got nervous from that combination. Jerry gulped and stopped again, bug-eyed and slack-jawed, a slight tremble in his hands.

 _He's really gonna pee his pants..._

\- Oh will you get on with it?! I swear, I'm working with morons!

Jerry jumped again at the outburst and Megamind couldn't help but snicker. Scarface was getting aggravated now. Good, he could use that, already his grip was looser.

Jerry opened the cigar case, but in stead of a Cuban cigar as one would expect he pulled out an old-school syringe with brass fittings filled with a pale golden liquid.

Megamind's eyes zoomed in on that nasty, little reminder of his past. Did they seriously think he'd _ever_ give them a chance to inject him with _that_?!

What was in that thing, anyway? He was _certain_ nothing had survived the fire! The color matched, but it had to be something else. Right?

Didn't they know he couldn't have any human pharmaceuticals? Well, no, probably not. But Doc did and if he _was_ alive and had hired these morons he would have told them, right? They had known the name, but with a lot of digging it _was_ possible to find out...

He was violently allergic (if you could call it an 'allergy', he was a god damn _alien_ ) to the point he couldn't even take vitamin pills! Humans put so many poisons in their medicines it was a miracle they weren't extinct.

* * *

Once he and Minion had experimented with all kinds of stuff, just to see if there was anything he _could_ have. In extremely small doses of course. Poor Minion, he had completely freaked out when the morphine left him clinically _dead_ for over two minutes! Of course Megamind hadn't been aware of the freaking out then, busy being dead and all, but he had seen the brainbot footage later.

Luckily nothing else straight-up killed him, but he reacted badly one way or another on everything they tried.

* * *

 _All right, need to get out of this. How?_

The syringe was out of the protective casing. He had leverage against Scarface.

 _I can work with this…_

He let Jerry approach, keeping an eye on the syringe, pressing back against Scarface as if he unconsciously were trying to avoid the thing.

Jerry got closer, Scarface relaxed his grip since the alien appeared to be frozen and Megamind decided he finally had enough room to maneuver.

His hands already resting on one of Scarface's arms, he put his weight on them while curling his entire body up, hanging from the arm holding him high across the chest. He kicked out, hitting Jerry straight in the chest with full force, sending him stumbling back and tripping over one of the other thugs.

Megamind heard a distinctive "crack" when the back of Jerry's head hit the pavement. He didn't get up again.

More importantly he'd dropped the syringe and it had rolled towards Megamind. Before Scarface had a chance to even think about reacting, still stunned by the sudden turn of events, Megamind had stomped on the syringe, breaking the glass and spilling the golden contents on the wet asphalt.

\- Hah!

Megamind let out a triumphant shout, still holding himself up by Scarface's arm that had gone relatively limp in shock.

When Megamind realized just how slack he quickly slipped under the arm, took hold of it, twisted his body and suddenly the last thug still standing was flying through the air, thrown by a man less than a third of his weight.

Five down, time used: 24.7 seconds.

* * *

Scarface lands hard on his back and a furious, blue alien is on him in an instance.

Megamind was Pissed Off. His unearthly green eyes drilled into those of the _fucking_ idiot on the ground below him. He pressed one pointy knee into the thug's solar plexus, putting all his weight on it. Snarling he twisted one hand in the collar so the seams almost ripped and his other hand pressed the barrel of his de-gun so hard into the idiot's temple that Megamind was sure he'd made a bruise.

Scarface gasped beneath him, struggling to breathe.

The thug was panicking. There wasn't a mark on the alien.

 _Five grown men against a scrawny, little alien and he doesn't have as much as a scratch!_

His couldn't help but stare, because the alien's eyes were _glowing_!

Megamind growled at him. A true growl. Not a word, just a savage, extraterrestrial sound no human could replicate that sparked some primal instinctive fear in the man beneath him. The glowing eyes of a true predator boring into his.

He whimpered at that and almost started to blubber.

Megamind grinned, half-crazed and wide, showing all his teeth. He could picture it now. All five of them in their own personal hell.

– I'll make you scream so prettily...

 _Actually scream, as opposed to another victim of mine, who apparently doesn't know how to do it or lack the lung capacity for it_.

– In my basement, all strung up like cattle, ready for slaughter…

He kept his voice to a rumbling almost-whisper and stroked the tip of the de-gun from the thug's temple to his ear and then to the point of his chin where Megamind pressed it hard under his jaw, making his head bend backwards, exposing the throat.

He'd keep them separated, knowing well how ignorance in this case would be far from bliss. A few pre-recorded screams to set the mood... He'd let them stew like that for a week or so, and then cart them off one by one to places they'd never run into each other again.

– How about a little Russian roulette first, hm?

He made the barrel of the de-gun spin by pulling it along his thigh, making sure it set to 'destroy' without appearing to actually control it. He took aim on the ground right by Scarface's ear and pulled the trigger, the gun jerking slightly in his hand and making the thug flinch. The setting was about medium, so it only melted the asphalt into a hot, glowing puddle that fizzed in the rain.

– You see, it does more that dehydrate things...

Scarface's eyes had gone saucer-huge by now and his lower lip was trembling. Megamind was sure he could feel the heat from the melted asphalt on the side of his face.

Megamind cocked his head and a raindrop slid down his nose and dropped into the still-glowing puddle of asphalt where it fizzed before evaporating.

He spun the barrel again, this time pointing it right between Scarface's eyes. His eyes went to the barrel, his mouth falling open and making the moron decidedly cockeyed.

– What do you think it landed on? I'm not sure myself. Should I pull the trigger?

His voice was almost conversational when he asked. He knew of course the setting was debilitate, since dehydrate would be pointless with the rain. It was a nasty setting, making the target a weeping mess usually, but it wasn't deadly. Still, he was angry, and would a singed ear really be that bad? He could use the lowest destroy-setting, that only caused a third-degree sunburn...

But no, he refused to harm even this jackass unless he didn't have a choice. He wasn't a savage human after all.

He drew the tip of the gun slowly down to the tip of the human's nose, imagining all kinds of things he could put these idiots through. There were so many things he could do without ever laying a finger on them. Even more if he'd been truly Evil, but he suspected only humans, Homo sapiens, could ever be _that_ evil.

* * *

Megamind was so into his fantasy of rehvange, fueled by the anger that these-there were no words in any language to describe how utterly idiotic these beings were- would even _try_ to fuck with him, that he didn't even notice when Phil woke up.

He didn't notice when Phil stood up, a little dazed and wobbly, cradling his broken hand.

Didn't notice when he saw the alien leaning over his partner, face turning dark.

Didn't notice when Phil picked up a piece of wood and started towards him.

Only noticed when his world went all topsy-turvy as something hard made contact with the back of his head and all the stars in the galaxy burst in front of his eyes.

Megamind's world tilted and he reflexively redirected his gun while automatically setting it to dehydrate. He saw a blurry shape coming towards him from behind the bursting stars and fired.

There was a blue flash and then his world turned pitch black.

* * *

 **If you want to see Megamind's 'Evil # 5' Go to Deviantart and find an artist named LockworkOrange and search the gallery for a pic called 'Megamind'. I found it after i wrote this and it's exactly how I imagined that grin to look! And LockworkOrange has amazing art!**


	6. The Plot Thickens

**I really wasn't happy with the previous chapter but I had to get it out. There was just something wrong with it, maybe I tried putting too much into it, I don't know... So! Here's a new chapter for you that I'm much more satisfied with :-D Hope you like it!**

* * *

 **Present day:**

Once again the invisible car pulled up in front of a shabby door but this time it was a human hand that knocked on it.

Frank Whilkins cursed under his breath as he had to abandon his lunch to answer.

 _Can't I even get to eat in peace?!_

He cursed again when he opened his door, louder this time and intending to give whoever it was a beating for interrupting him, when he saw the robotic henchfish staring at him in a less-than-friendly way along with four brainbots eyeing him hungrily.

Frank took a step back from the door, into the cluttered hallway, almost tripping over a jacket tossed carelessly on the dirty linoleum floor.

Minion advanced on him and grabbed the front of his shirt in his metal hands before Frank could fall, twisting it so that the collar tightened around his neck and made Frank give a frightened squeak.

Minion stepped further into the hallway. Both of the mechanical hands were now holding his shirt. The fish walked him backwards towards the next room, his office/kitchen. Somehow the front door closed behind the huge gorilla-body without it being apparent how; that door always slipped open if Frank didn't use force when he closed it.

Several of those freaky flying bots hovered behind the fish, and one came around and behind himself, and Frank could feel the thing eyeing his head! Right now he couldn't care less about the one that zoomed past and into his office.

Another movement faintly registered in the back of his mind, revealing itself to be that reporter stepping out from behind Minion.

– Wh- what's goin' on here?

Frank Whilkins had never been what you'd call 'brave'. He preferred the shadows and dealing through middle-men, deals with pickup-points and no questions asked. The only reason he dealt with the alien face-to-face was because he wasn't given a choice; it was either that or 'get out of town'. Other than him he always used a double-blind, both himself and the receiver used errand boys who never saw faces or heard names, just left the goods at the right places.

Except when he dealt with the one thing he really, really wished he could be anonymous to, and now it came back to bite him in the ass.

He tried backing out of the tight grip but that creepy fish just twisted his hand more and tightened the collar to the point it was making him choke, before releasing slightly again, just barely enough for him to breathe. Frank could hear a grown behind him and then something touched his shoulder, sending a shiver down his spine.

Minion took a firm grip and almost lifted Frank off his feet, pulling him close to his dome so Frank could see the razor-sharp teeth and snarled at him.

– What did you do?!

 _Oh shit I'm gonna die..._

* * *

Minion knew he didn't have any proof that Frank actually _did_ something to Sir, but he had Miss Ritchi's word and that was good enough, especially together with what her informant had of details. There were really just one 'Frank W. dealing with import/export' they had any dealings with.

When Frank opened the door Minion knew he was guilty just from the look in his eyes. He grabbed his collar just as he tried to back away and twisted his hand, making sure his target wouldn't get away.

Four brainbots flew into the hallway, two flanking Minion, one behind Frank hovering right behind his head, growling, and the last one floated further inside and started poking at papers and plugging itself into Franks computer it found at a desk.

Minion had never liked the little man, but he was important to their operation. Frank came off as a slippery eel. Already Minion felt like he needed to change his water and give his suit a good scrub.

Frank's hair was slicked over to one side, a desperate attempt to hide the oncoming baldness, and it _always_ needed a wash. His shirt had probably once been green but was so faded it almost looked grey, and the jeans were washed out years ago. The light coming in the door and filtering through Minion's suit and dome looked strange on Frank, like he was a creature nature intended to hide in the shadows and crawl around lurking in the night.

Minion took a few steps into the building, pushing Frank backwards and forcing him to step back unless he wanted to get dragged. He heard Miss Ritchie close the door behind them and Frank's attention flashed behind Minion's back for half a second.

– Wh- What's goin' on here?

The worm in Minion's hand tried to get away, so he twisted his grip even more, cutting off some of Frank's air. He made a choking sound and Minion loosened his grip just enough to let him breathe. Then he took hold with his other hand and practically lifted Frank off the floor, bringing him right up to his dome. Minion bared all of his teeth and gave the human a vicious snarl.

– What did you do?!

Minion glared down at the pudgy man dangling from his metallic fists. He could see the fear light up in those grey eyes, and a spark of guilt! This creature _did_ something to his Sir, and Minion wasn't having any of it.

He was here for answers and he was going to _get_ answers!

– What - did - you - do?

– I- I I I... Nothing! I didn't do anything! I don't know what-ghk!

The old 'I don't know what you're talking about' just infuriated Minion even more. He tightened his hands in Frank's shirt so the seam on the back started to rip and bared his teeth, already struggling to keep his temper. There was nothing on this planet that could make him loose his cool like someone threatening his Sir, and this creep checked all the points. He wanted to _bite_ him!

– I said: what did you do? We're not leaving until _you_ have told us _everything_! It's up to you whether or not you're still alive when we leave...

– What? No! No no no I don't know shit, I swear! He was here, I told you before, but he left and I aint' seen the blue freak since!

Too late Frank realized what he'd called Megamind.

– I- I mean-

He didn't get out another word because Minion's face had turned dark and dangerous as his fingers wrapped themselves around the man's throat now and squeezed. Frank was turning a bright red and his eyes bulged, both with the pressure and the icy fear running up his spine.

You just never _ever_ called Megamind names like that in Minion's presence and expected to walk away unharmed.

Even the brainbots looked aggravated, the one behind Frank now nibbling on his ear with it's bear-trap jaws.

– Miss Ritchi, would you mind stepping into the hallway for a second? And close the door.

Minion's voice was colder than the Arctic in the dead of winter and Roxanne was surprised the water in his dome didn't freeze over. Frank instantly somehow went dead white _and_ red, despite Minion's choke-hold, and started wildly thrashing around, trying to get out of this death grip. He tried to no avail to bend the hydraulic fingers away from his throat, only resulting in broken nails and bloody fingers. His feet kicked and connected with the gorilla-suit's equivalent of a groin, but except a 'clang' and an annoyed look from Minion he didn't achieve anything.

Roxanne came around from behind Minion and looked at the man dangling from metal fists.

– I suggest you start talking, Frank. Not to mention apologizing. I've never seen Minion this angry before, there's really no telling what he'll do to you...

Roxanne made a circuit around Frank's back, trying for the whole ' _I totally know what he'll do to you and it won't be pretty so I don't want to watch that_ '-thing while trying to not let her nerves show through her voice or reveal that Minion didn't intend to hurt him (much).

She also tried to not touch anything; the floor was sticky, there were leftover food on the bench that should have been thrown out weeks ago and she was surprised the unidentifiable substance in a bowl on the table didn't say 'hello'. Even the walls in this place gave her the creeps.

She knew of course Minion wouldn't kill the man, but she was pretty sure he wasn't above hurting Frank if he refused to give any answers. Especially now! Even she wouldn't mind using her pointy heels for something other than looking good right now.

At the doorway she looked back at Frank and gave him a knowing wink.

– Don't take too long.

The door hadn't even closed all the way before she heard a scream from the other room.

She closed the door all the way and caught herself just in time before she leaned on the door-frame (she didn't want to have to burn her clothes when they got back, this place was horrible!). And she'd have to ask Minion if they could swing by her apartment so she could pack some clothes. It was obvious by now she'd stay in the lair until they found Megamind.

* * *

On Minion's side of the door Frank gave a scream as the alien fish lifted him up into the ceiling before letting go. Frank crashed to the sticky floor and Minion put one of his feet on the traitor's chest, not enough to hurt him but plenty to scare the hell out of him.

– I'm only going to ask one more time; What. Did you do. To Sir? Keep in mind that a seven hundred pound robotic suit is standing on your chest and I'm just _begging_ for a reason to put my foot down.

His voice was unnervingly calm when he leaned over and put a little more of his weight on the foot placed on Frank's chest to prove his point. Minion hadn't thought it possible but Frank actually got even paler. He gaped at Minion, mouth working like a non-sentient fish on land.

– I- I I I c-cant't! They'll kill me!

– And you think I _won't_?

Minion was furious now and had to tell himself that that potentially murderous rage coiling inside him was best saved for dealing with whoever had paid this lowlife to betray Sir. Frank just wasn't worth it.

A tiny bit more pressure and Frank got a look of pure terror. Nobody ever really considered it, but Megamind wasn't the only one who'd grown up in a prison. Minion knew all he'd ever need about scare tactics and intimidation and then some. He knew Frank would talk eventually. It just remained to see if he needed any broken bones.

After a few seconds of silence Minion decided Frank needed some incentive.

– Frank. Do you remember Don? Former crime boss, about seven feet tall, built like a tank, could almost rival Metro Man in size?

Frank only nodded.

– And do you know where he is now?

Frank slowly shook his head. Nobody knew. He'd just disappeared one night.

– And do you know _why_ that is? It's because we don't _want_ anyone to know. The leftovers were... somewhat gruesome. The brainbots really did a nice job, you know, hiding him. Here and there. After Sir was done with him.

Frank audibly gulped.

– Would you like to join him, Frank? I'm sure the brainbots would have a lot of fun with you. It's been a long time since they had a chance to play...

At that three of the brainbots swooped forward and started clanking their jaws right in Frank's face. Kenny grabbed his hand and squeezed enough to leave a mark while Stan poked his tendrils at his face.

And that was all Frank needed. He broke down completely and actually started wailing.

– Then start talking!

Minion was getting impatient and wanted to get this over with. He hated having to play the 'violent henchman'. Thank the evil gods that rarely happened, usually it was just a show of strength to back up Sir (most people did anything Sir wanted if he mentioned Minion's hydraulic arms), but he had been forced to hurt people before and he always felt horrible afterwards. Only Sir'd refusal kept him from sending an 'I'm sorry'-gift basket.

– Okay, okay, I will, please don't feed me to the brainbots! I'll tell you everything I know! Just, please, please...

– I'm waiting...

Frank started blabbering and it didn't take him long to tell everything. He was talking so fast one could barely tell the words apart. Luckily Minion was experienced in deciphering 'Excited Megamindish' so he didn't have any problem understanding Frank.

Frank had been approached by a guy named Charles No-Last-Name. He'd never seen the man before but this Charles definitely knew who Frank was. He had started by showing Frank several pictures and documents that would mean life in jail if the authorities ever got hold of them. Charles had made it clear that Frank could choose between helping them or having the police knocking on the door within minutes. He would get paid so long as he delivered.

The instructions said to start taking more than his cut and let Megamind find out. Charles had known he already was doing that but had told him to up the amount. All Frank had to do was get Megamind's attention and make sure he would be visited by the alien. Since they wouldn't know when Megamind would show up Frank had been given a burner-phone with a single number to keep on him at all times and just press the call-button as soon as the supervillain made his appearance and then stall him for as long as possible, Charles would take care of the rest.

Megamind had showed up and they'd had a long talk about loyalty, consequences and the benefits of a supervillain's business. Then he'd left and that was the last Frank had seen of him. The next day he'd woken up to a text that the sum of 25 000 dollars had been deposited to his account during the night. He hadn't seen or heard from Charles again and that had been the end of it.

– I want the phone and I want access to your accounts.

The tone Minion used left no room for negotiations. Frank nodded eagerly on the floor and pointed at a desk. Minion took his foot off his chest and went to look.

– Stay!

Frank didn't move from his spot on the floor while Minion rummaged around in the desk drawers, Cartman, one of the bitier brainbots, hovered over Frank's chest and using it's tendrils to poke around on his potential toy. If he behaved maybe uncle Minion would let him play?.

In less than a minute Minion was back and showed Frank a cellphone.

– Is this it?

Frank nodded again and prayed the fish would leave him alone now.

– And your accounts. I want passwords and numbers. Now.

Frank rattled off some numbers and a password. He had only one account, the idiot, and his password was actually 'Password789'!

– Thank you for your cooperation. I'll be seeing you. Kyle! Bring the laptop and every phone, hard-drive, memory-stick and anything else that can store information you find. Notebooks too! Never mind about cleaning up when you're done.

Thinking that was the end of it Frank got up on his elbows, the back of his shirt making a sort of ripping sound when pried away from the sticky floor, watching Minion head for the door now held open by the reporter. Three brainbots followed him, but Frank stayed on the floor until 'Kyle' had passed over him three minutes later, carrying his laptop, three sticks, his little black book and another phone.

– Oh, just one more thing.

Minion turned back to Frank and he was now holding a gun.

It looked like the one Megamind never left home without but this one was a slightly different design, a bit more chunky, matching Minion's suit much better than the elegant gun belonging to his master would, with silver green and blue decorations instead of Megamind's gold plating and filigree, but overall the same main design.

Minion didn't use his own gun often. He rarely even brought it along during plots since he had a sort of 'free pass' so he could get Sir out of jail so the game could continue. He still remembered when Sir had asked if he wanted a gun. He'd asked Minion what kind of design he would like, type of metal (as long as it had the right properties) size, everything. It was as much Minion's own design as his master's and Minion loved it.

He pulled the trigger and Frank had just enough time for his eyes to widen in fear before a familiar blue beam shot out at him.

Minion went to pick up the blue cube, put it in a waterproof, pressurized compartment in his suit and turned around to Roxanne while hiding his gun somewhere else.

– Remind me never to get on your bad side.

She gave him an impressed smile while moving out of his way so he could get his bulky body out of the little office/kitchen. He looked at her but didn't smile back.

– I hated that...

He was muttering and Roxanne almost didn't catch what he was saying.

– But I had to. He knew things.

Minion looked miserable now, a far cry from his thunderous expression he'd had when he asked her to wait outside. He was staring at the floor as they walked out of the building and into the suddenly overcast day.

The weather seemed to match their mood; clouds had rolled in while they were talking to Frank and the horizon Roxanne could barely glimpse between the buildings looked dark and foreboding. It would rain soon, she was sure of it, and she was pretty sure she could hear thunder in the distance too.

– I know. I heard. You did what you had to do. You're a good minion, you know. Megamind is lucky to have you.

Minion smiled at her in gratitude, but it didn't reach his eyes. She could see this had really bothered him, and it didn't surprise her. Minion had always been a sweet and sensitive fish and Roxanne had never even seen him truly angry until today. Annoyed, yes, exasperated at his boss? Yes definitely. But not break-your-back-angry like today.

He pressed a button on the car key and the invisible car beeped and flashed once into visibility before turning invisible again (a useful feature for when his boss had been distracted when parking).

He went to open the door for Miss Ritchi and then went around to get in himself.

They were silent for several minutes, both thinking their own things. The atmosphere was heavy and Roxanne looked over at Minion every time he seemed on the verge of saying something, but he never made a sound. In the end it was Roxanne who broke the silence.

– Minion... I've been thinking.

– About what, Miss Ritchi?

– What-

Long pause.

– -what if we don't find him? What if he's... gone?

She couldn't make herself say 'dead'. That would make the possibility real and she was surprised at just how much that made her heart ache. That she'd never see him again. She'd never see his enthusiastic face grinning at her or him bouncing around between laser-shots and spiked inventions, cackling like a maniac and looking like he was having the time of his life.

She couldn't imagine her life without him somehow in it. She couldn't even begin to imagine it. She'd miss his bad puns, his horrible sense of timing, his flirty banter, his eyes, his... him.

Minion kept staring straight ahead at the road. Miss Ritchi's question were an outcome he had refused to even remotely consider ever since Sir disappeared. There was just no option other than finding him.

He was still alive, Minion knew that much. There was... something. He couldn't name it, see it or taste it, but it was there and he was certain Sir was still alive somewhere. They had a connection Minion hadn't been aware of before, but then, the last time they'd spent a long period away from each other he was still young and not fully developed yet. He'd had a constant feeling of presence since Sir disappeared except a sort of "blip" feeling twenty-four days later.

He stubbornly refused to contemplate what that blip might have meant.

– I- don't know... I can't think about that. It's just not a possibility, I have to find him, end of story. I'll never stop looking.

He spoke with such forceful conviction that Roxanne knew he was dead serious. He'd _never_ stop looking, no matter how long it took or where he might end up, and Roxanne realized she never would either. That was the moment she realized that if she was the one gone missing Megamind would tear up the world trying to find her and to hell with his 'evil persona'.

She was not going to do anything less and she knew she'd do the same if it was Minion who was missing.

So she was considered a 'good girl', Metro Man's girl, virtuous, standing against evil, so what?! Megamind was a villain, but that didn't mean everyone should just think 'good riddance' and not care he was missing!

– We'll find him.

She put her hand on Minion's arm trying to comfort herself just as much as him. He looked back at her and gave her a watery smile before looking back to the road as they headed back to the lair.

* * *

 **Somewhere outside Metro City:**

Before he even opened his eyes he knew he wasn't in Evil Lair.

It smelt wrong, the sounds were wrong, the light was wrong- there were no sounds from brainbots, the massive air condition unit was quiet and the room he was in just _felt_ wrong. He wasn't sure what it was. Did it feel the wrong size?

His bedroom in Evil Lair wasn't big either, but the quality was- different.

Maybe Minion had gotten one of his impulsive redecoration fits? When that happened there was no way to predict which room got the brunt of it or how it would look when finished. Granted, Minion had never attacked his bedroom with him _in it_ before, but- nothing's impossible...

 _I hope he didn't change the color scheme this time. Pink is_ not _my color, I don't_ care _if it compliments my skin-tone…_

He laid still for a few more seconds contemplating colors and his existence in general, wondering exactly what the future held for him outside his own mind before deciding it was time for a look around.

The first feelings he recognized when opening his eyes was mix of confusion and confirmation; nope, this certainly wasn't his bedroom.

The second feeling he registered before he had the chance to form another thought was an intense pain behind his eyes that lanced through his skull in a splitting headache, centering at the back of his head. He was forced to close his eyes against the light and it helped a little.

 _Did I get drunk last night? Where the hell am I?!_

He tried to remember what he'd done, but all he could recall was explaining, _again_ , to Frank how stupid it was to cross a super-villain. It was possible he'd stopped by a bar and taken a drink in disguise after that, but wasn't Minion making Mac n' cheese? He told him to 'make something special' and that always meant McCheese and there was no way in hell Megamind would miss that because of a _drink_!

He vaguely remembered talking to someone after leaving Frank's place but he couldn't place faces or remember what he'd said.

And oh, great, _thinking_ made his headache worse.

 _Okay, focus on something else. What am I lying on? What am I wearing?_

He moved around a little bit, noticing he was a bit sore.

(The image of a scarred face flashed across his mind along with a strange feeling he couldn't quite place.)

He tried to get a feel for the fabric, the mattress and if he was wearing his suit or his pajama.

He quickly found out he didn't have neither uniform or pj's on. Whatever it was it was _loose_ (he despised loose clothing, they made him feel naked and unprotected) and very thin, sleeves going about halfway down his arms, also very loose. It felt like he was wearing nothing but a long shirt. And no pants!

 _What the fuck_ is _this?!_

At least someone had left him with his underwear...

Could he have been sick? Maybe his conversation with Frank had been a dream. It was possible, he had very vivid and realistic dreams... No, that didn't explain the strange room he found himself in... Or the strange clothes, Minion would never put him in something like this!

The room was cold, too, and he realized he didn't have a cover of any kind. The fabric of his shirt was stiff and couldn't have a thread-count over five, which translated to an insulating ability of zero.

 _I miss my own bed._

His bed at Evil Lair. He'd stolen it from a high-end store. It was the most expensive he could find at the time, a monster over a meter thick, with thousands of springs, memory foam, something called "cassettes in three zones" and just over 14 000 USD, and it was the most comfortable he'd ever slept, that first night.

That had been a huge leap from the things they called "beds" in prison. Now, however, he could feel the springs through the "mattress", just like where he grew up, and it was squeaking when he moved. A lovely, grating sound comparable to talons across a blackboard, and it did wonders for his headache.

There wasn't much else information to get from his current position, so he decided to take the next step.

 _Time to take another look._

He opened his eyes slowly and just enough to take a peek before closing them quickly again.

The room had been dimly lit, but still enough to affect his headache. He guessed a bare 40 watt bulb, maybe 60 watts, depending on the height it was at.

He'd only been able see bare concrete walls and floor, no windows or pictures or door or anything else someone would have if this was someone's home. It did, however, have all the looks of a cell.

 _Outstanding._

A worried knot started to form in his stomach. He hated waking up not knowing where he was. Even the few seconds it took when he woke up in the prison infirmary was too long for his taste.

Finally he decided that it was time to wake up properly. He opened his eyes again and squinted annoyed at the light before focusing on the darker wall. The light stabbed at his brain at first, but gradually subsided to a dull throb at the back of his skull as he remained still, refusing to let the light win and waiting for the spikes that rattled around to go away.

The concrete walls were still there, unfortunately. He'd had a small hope it had been a hallucination brought on by the headache, that he was actually back in Evil Lair, but no such luck.

Slowly he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and planted his feet on the cold concrete floor. They hadn't even let him keep his socks! He hunched over and placed his hands on the edge of the bed, holding himself up. There he had to wait for a few seconds for the first wave of dizziness to subside. Finally getting up he walked over to a wall, wrapping his arms around himself against the chilly air and started to investigate the room.

The walls were all bare, not even painted, and they looked old. Abandoned for years, most likely, almost exactly like the state of the basement when they moved into the current Evil Lair. Streaks of moisture were running down from the ceiling and he could feel the moisture in the stale air that had a distinctly moldy taste.

This couldn't possibly be healthy to breathe in.

The light source was indeed a single 60 watt bulb hanging in the middle of the room hanging from a black cord stapled into the ceiling and along the wall before disappearing into it. The ceiling was surprisingly high and far above his head. Even with a long piece of cord the light bulb was still a good three meters above his head.

Turning around to scan the rest of the room he winced, a hand instinctively going to his neck; it was stiff as a board. He turned his head this way and that, finding he could just barely turn to the right before it got painful. Left was okay. He'd slept at an angle, then. He rolled his eyes for no-one in particular. Lovely, without Minion's skills he'd be stiff for days!

No windows, but there was a door (obviously) in the wall facing the head of his bed. Inspecting the door he found it locked; not surprising but annoying none the less.

It was one of those fireproof metal doors, with a tumbler-lock but no keyhole or even handle on his side, just the sealed piece of metal housing where a keyhole should have been and a plate crudely welded over the hole for the door knob, the paint surrounding it singed and scratched. The door would turn outwards, so removing the embedded steel frame wouldn't help even if he had tools to do it with and there were no hinges he could compromise.

 _I need tools..._

He took a step back from the door to take another look around the room.

If he could reach the light-bulb and get the wire loose he could electrify the door, give anyone on the other side a nasty shock. With a bit of acrobatics he _might_ get a hold of the power cord running along the ceiling, and maybe just his weight could pull the whole thing down. He knew he could make something out of it if he could reach it.

He noticed the bed was bolted to the floor so he couldn't move it to stand on without somehow prying it loose first, and he still couldn't see any tools having magically appeared in front of him... Maybe he could- jump on the bed and then get high enough to grab the cord?

Not one to waste time Megamind stepped up on said bed and tried a few bounces, looked up at the light bulb, judged the distance, angle, thrust and tested some more. Not the springiest bed in the world but it had potential if he could- tweak the springs... with tools...

He stood staring up at the ceiling, following the cord back and forth, from light bulb to wall and back again, absently bouncing on the balls of his feet, making the bed creak, ignoring how the light stabbed him and contemplated how he'd get out of here, his mind running fifty miles a minute.

Growling he jumped off the useless bed and looked around again for anything else he could utilize, turning 360 degrees in a circle while standing in the middle of the room.

 _Nothing_ …

Suddenly a wave of dizziness hit him and threatened to make him see stars again, forcing him to sit down. His head was swimming and he pressed his thumbs to his temples, resting his long fingers along the side and top of his head and closed his eyes. Maybe getting up wasn't such a great idea... Thinking was still a bit painful too, but getting better.

There wasn't much more information he could get from the cell itself. If he could just remember what happened then maybe he could piece together-

('...from an old friend...')

 _Oh no... not again..._

Megamind was glad he was already sitting down when the memories returned with full force, or he'd probably have fallen flat on his face.

The shock of remembering hit him like a physical blow and left him hyperventilating and with tunnel vision. Everything came back to him at once. The talk with Frank, the guys following him after he left, Scarface and his oh-so-cool brass knuckles, the syringe he broke... Doc's name like an ice cold hurricane from the past.

Those creeping cold fingers of pure terror were back with full force, clawing up his back, taking up residence in his chest, making him cold to the core, numbing his limbs and making it impossible to think rationally, to think at _all,_ and they were digging up old memories he'd used years to suppress and made them real again, holding them up for him to get a real good look he didn't want.

Megamind collapsed onto his side on his bed, breathing too hard and too fast. He pulled his legs up to his chest, pushing his head into his knees and tried to only focus on slowing down his breathing, forcing away any conscious thought. Squeezing his eyes shut he hugged himself into an even tighter miserable ball and desperately tried to find his bubble.

It took almost half an hour of mental acrobatics and carefully evading certain memories before he finally managed to conjure up the mental vacuum needed to form the bubble and he could loose himself in the black abyss.

* * *

 **Yeah, Megamind likes South Park! And his favorite is Cartman since he's obviously 'bad' (minus his racist tendencies). He named the brainbot that because it's a bad bot that likes to eat Daddy's capes and bite him. Kenny had been repaired so many times the name became obvious while Kyle and Stan got their names on the same day and likes watching Cartman getting time-outs for being naughty.**

 **Oh, and the bed Megamind stole is real! 14 000 USD for a bed! I'm serious! Of course he'd steal that one ;-)**

 **And I guess I should mention: "the former crime-boss Don" is currently living it up in the Maldives, not missing so much as a single toe ;-)**


	7. Some clever title, running out of ideas

**I had no idea where to start, fill in or end this two-part chapter! But at least I have the epilogue basically done!**

 **And thank you to Psychochiqucita and MegsForEVA1 for ideas and suggestions!**

* * *

 **Outside Metro City, day 1.**

Slowly he comes back to himself from the deep, black fog of unconsciousness, noticing how his body is aching but can't remember exactly why.

That feeling is familiar. He knows he's been out of it for three hours and forty-seven minutes, he's thirsty and something is horribly wrong.

It takes some time for the last of the fog and sticky cobwebs to clear and he's a bit confused about where he is at first, but he's waking up fast.

And he knows...

He knows where he is, he remember the details of his cell and he knows what will happen, and that knowledge sends ice-shards straight back into his bones. He can feel the tingling sensation at the back of his head as it spreads like cold fire, dread racing along the neural paths and he slams his walls up as fast as he can.

He _can't_ afford to panic again!

His first order of business is locking up the last of his panicking mind in a sound-proof vault and throw the key so far away that _time itself_ won't find it.

 _That_ wasn't an easy task.

He stayed on his bed, curling up against the chill in the room and the ice in his bones, clamped his jaw until his teeth hurt and squeezed his eyes shut against the horrifying reality, while trying to slow both his shaky breathing and his stuttering heart-rate. His fingers was digging into his upper arms so hard one of his nails drew blood, but the slight twinge of pain was a welcome distraction.

This was too much. The memories of last time crawling to the forefront of his mind from where he thought he'd buried them for good, a long, long time ago.

He curls tighter, smaller, squeezing his eyes shut and swallows hard to get rid of that boulder suddenly lodged in his throat.

He stays like that for what seems like a long time, fighting _himself_ as much as his situation, but eventually he calms down enough to think straight again, even if he's breathing hard.

He relaxes his hands, letting go of his arms and they fall loosely onto the mattress. He can feel how all the muscles down his back lets go, aching slightly from the tension over the last- what, hour? He can't be sure. He's as limp as a cordless doll now and he's not even sure _what_ he's looking at. The wall probably, not much else in here.

It feels like he's just gone up against Metro Douche for a week straight, but he finally has his _mind_ back and can start planning!

When he's gotten the rest of himself under reasonable control he stays still, thinking of what to do next.

 _I want to move..._

He's too jittery to stay down much longer and after a little more than a dignified crawl out of bed and a _long_ stretch he starts with a bit of work-out, just to piss them off, but it also helps to burn some of that nervous energy that's crawling all over him and making his skin itch.

He's irritable now; at himself, at _them_ , at- well...

He _hates_ feeling weak with a burning passion, and now he needs to _do_ something or he'll end up breaking his wrists on the walls.

The activity even helps to further calm down his raging thoughts spinning a light-year every second.

He's still screaming inside, of course, rattling the mental bars (apparently the vault wasn't entirely sound-proof, he had to look into that), but outside he appears calm and collected, going about what could be his normal daily routine.

It's all about presentation, after all.

And it _is_ normal, actually.

Most mornings he'd do some exercise or other, at least on days he didn't have an Evil Plan to execute.

Sometimes he'd train with the brainbots, sometimes with Minion (then they'd usually do some sparring, it kept him agile and Minion got some training in _reflexively_ using his suit instead of having to consciously think of the movements, even though he was getting really good at it) and sometimes he just went running in Evil Lair (usually including some jumping, what did they call it, park-hour? He'd always wondered what hours in the park had to do with anything?)

He's pretty sure they're watching him too, but he can't care. There's an annoying, high-pitched whine of electronics coming from somewhere in his cell, but the bare walls make it echo so it's impossible to pinpoint a direction.

It's too high for the human ear to detect but just barely within range for his. He can't see anything resembling a camera, not even something that could be a _disguised_ regular camera, but it has to be there. It's possible it's one of those spy-cameras; the lens would be just a fraction of an inch and if it's integrated into the wall it would just look like a speck...

If they wanted to watch him work out, let them, he decided.

Because he knows exactly what they're trying to do.

They're trying to break him down. No food or water, no information, no way to keep the time (or so they think, he _is_ a genius after all) is just a way to make him more compliant for what was to come.

'Tell us this and we'll give you that'.

'Make us this and you'll get that'.

('Stay quiet and we'll let you sleep'.)

A normal person would have started pacing, would have gotten stressed and nervous, maybe started shouting at the door or anyone they might think were listening. They'd get paranoid, thinking they were being watched and if it went really far they could get hallucinations or delusions.

But he's never been 'normal'. Some people say he's not a 'person' either, but most of the time he don't believe them.

He knew what they were doing and that made it much easier to predict and counteract them.

The only thing that's sure to break him is a lack of water. In the end willpower doesn't matter; after enough time any organism would do anything if the reward was something to drink and that was all they needed. Just one crack in the armor.

He could only hope they didn't have the patience to wait a week and a half for that to happen.

Thinking helps him focus. He narrows his thoughts to one single glowing point of searing white. He's getting out of here. He's not seventeen anymore. He's a fucking _supervillain_ , and supervillains don't let themselves be held in a cage this easily!

Over the next hour he analyzes every possible outcome of different actions from his and their side. So far it's not much to go on, he's still stuck in his cell-

 _Not_ my _cell._ A _cell, there's a_ difference _!_

* * *

When they came for him it would be either in force to intimidate or a single person intended for him to 'bond' with, a sort of 'good cop-bad cop' thing.

('I'm your only friend in here, trust me, rely on me, depend on me')

Then it would start with little favors...

('I'm struggling with this equation', 'how would you solve this scenario')

And before he knew it he'd be chained to a wall like a a damn supercomputer and _that's_ when the real tests would start.

It was so very very not going to work.

Or, they would come for him _en masse_ , manhandle him and not beat around the bush.

He was sort of hoping for the latter, it was easier to deal with.

* * *

After work-out and with nothing else to do (the light bulb was out of reach, jumping on the bed was a bust and they had been really thorough emptying the cell for absolutely everything he could use and securing anything else) he lays down again on his squeaky bed, legs straight out, folds his hands over his stomach after adjusting the 'pillow' (he had to roll it lengthwise to even get a hint of thickness) under his neck and closes his eyes.

If they don't want to provide him with any information then _he_ won't give _them_ anything to watch either. Whoever was monitoring the camera was in for a boring shift.

He has to suppress a small evil laugh at that. He's determined to do any little thing he can to annoy them to no end, even if that 'thing' is doing nothing at all.

Megamind has never been a _patient_ creature, but he knows how to _wait_.

He's _good_ at waiting.

He can out-wait _anyone_.

* * *

He had been meditating for five hours and thirty-two minutes when someone finally came to the door.

* * *

 **Within city limits, Saturday afternoon, 4 1/2 weeks missing** :

When they had arrived back at Evil Lair after visiting with Frank, Minion had taken the blue cube and placed it in a climate-controlled, reinforced Plexiglas box already containing eight other cubes. It was kept in a vault at the center of Evil Lair, not far from Sir's idea-room.

He needed to keep track of which cube was Frank so he placed it in a separate shelf from the other cubes. He did _not_ want to accidentally rehydrate any of the others in there. He shuddered when he thought about the last one Sir dehydrated. That was about a year ago. It had been messy but necessary to secure both their lives and spot as top of the food-chain.

After dealing with Frank the cube he had guided Miss Ritchi to another bank of monitors located on the opposite side of the curtained-off area as the hub while insisting on carrying her bag to her room for her.

They'd made a quick stop at her place so she could throw some clothes and other things in a bag instead of having to go back and forth between the lair and her apartment. While waiting in the invisible car while she was packing Minion had sent orders to some of the brainbots still in Evil Lair to start constructing a guest-bedroom. He'd given them pretty much free reign, he was too on edge about Sir to be able to concentrate on interior decoration.

After showing her their search-programs he'd gone to the kitchen to fix some food; a simple beef stew that basically cooked itself, so he could join Ma- Miss Ritchi at the monitors and keep working.

* * *

Now they were digging up what they could about Charles Osorto, formerly known as Charles No-Name.

He was a former stockbroker, 42 years old, who'd done one too many inside deals and ended up in the Prison for the Criminally gifted ten years ago to serve a six-year sentence.

Minion barely remembered him, Osorto had been imprisoned just before he and Megamind made their definite escape (Minion hadn't been back since and Megamind never stayed long).

In addition, Osorto had been kept in a different wing than Megamind usually was in when he 'stopped by', so they didn't really know the guy personally, mostly by reputation and second hand information. Megamind had only met him twice, once during lunch and once during exercise when he'd 'told Osorto to behave'.

From what else they had heard Osorto had kept his head low and never had much contact with the other inmates during his serving. He interacted of course, but he didn't seem to make any connections as was usual in a prison.

He'd had it in for Megamind from day one of his incarceration, convinced the blue alien was the one who'd exposed his more shady habits and landed him in prison.

That was, of course, a flawed conclusion. It was actually the MCPD who'd done their job, but it didn't really help that Megamind had gotten a nice score on the last deal that got Osorto busted.

They always used middle-men when dealing in stocks (and almost everything else), but Osorto had somehow figured out who 'James Newport' from Canada really was anyway (a quite impressive feat, Megamind's aliases were always thorough and with histories going all the way back to childhood. Too many fake identities were discovered because the person appeared to just 'pop up' without any previous history like parking tickets, school diplomas, maybe a root canal).

Within the hour the stew was done and they ate by the monitors.

* * *

Roxanne had been scrolling down one of the screens displaying the results of the first searches while eating her dinner. It was amazing as always, and the iced tea Minion had made accented it perfectly.

But she couldn't really concentrate on the food (and neither could Minion, she could tell).

She was focused on the incredible amount of data that was coming out of the printer.

An hour wasn't really a lot of time to find anything of significance on a person who wanted to stay out of the light, but Megamind's search programs were thorough.

 _Really_ thorough.

The interface was like any other program, but Roxanne suspected they somehow automatically hacked into things like the DMV, tax records, hospitals, news and any conceivable place for information to hide, in addition to doing regular searches on the internet. Then the program cross-referenced what it found and came up with different IDs who were possibly the same person. If there were pictures they were compared by an advanced facial recognition software while cross-referencing with medical records, dental, rap-sheet, registered cars, properties and observations by traffic cams (those also worked on facial recognition somehow, but she didn't want to know how because that was _really_ not legal).

Basically everything was investigated.

In the end several possibilities were presented as the final result on four screens, one of which she was facing, plus prints.

She was very careful about not asking about those programs, or what Megamind would do with the people who had confirmed multiple IDs. She had noticed Minion discreetly saving the people with several identities somewhere in their system.

It was surprising how many people actually had different IDs.

Unfortunately they were no closer to find an actual _address_ for Osorto, so they were no closer to finding him now than they had been before they even got back to the lair.

They knew now, however, that he'd had his appendix removed when he was twenty-one, the last time he visited a dentist was five years ago and his house loan had been foreclosed so he had a hefty debt.

Right now Minion was still tapping away on two keyboards at once, trying any new search-words or combinations he could think of, while Roxanne was at the end of the desk near the printer going over pictures of possible targets.

(When did she start thinking like this? 'Targets'? Seriously? She sounds like a- an assassin or something!)

She had a mug of Jasmine tea standing on the desk in addition to the iced tea what went with the dinner. It was placed next to a pile of papers weighed down by a wrench, but it was cold long ago and barely touched. The pink brainbot that had apparently decided Roxanne was it's new best friend was eyeing the wrench hungrily but kept it's distance.

Throwing the last picture back on the desk she sat back and rubbed her eyes. She hadn't had much sleep lately, and what sleep she _had_ gotten was interrupted by strange dreams. She doubted Minion slept very well either, his usual vivid green was dull and she could see a slight reddish tint in his eyes.

They needed more!

More of everything.

More information.

More sleep.

More time...

She stared at the monitors. At the brainbots, the blinking computer-cores, the amazing technology found nowhere else in the world and chewed her lip while trying to think of what she was missing.

There was something they had overlooked, but she was confident Megamind's search programs would dig up every last speck of information there was to find on the net.

On _the net... But what about_ off _?_

With a look of epiphany she turned to Minion, eyes wide.

Osorto was a _convict_!

\- We need to talk with the warden.

She could see Minion's jaw drop as he turned slowly around in his bowl from the huge bank of monitors (there seemed to be monitor-banks all over the lair, she'd already lost count) and gave her a look as if she had suddenly turned completely and utterly crazy.

\- You really think _that's_ where he's been this whole time?! I- He'd _never_ stay in there without-

His voice was several octaves higher than normal and he could feel he was starting a rant and _still_ didn't know what to say as he almost walked in place, not knowing where to put himself.

Did she _really_ think his Sir would be back in prison without informing him?!

They _always_ had ways to communicate, no matter where on the planet they were at any one time. There were backups! And backups to the backups! And Minion had used every single channel they had and still no answer!

Sir was _not_ in prison! He was _missing_ and Minion didn't know _where_ he was or _how_ to get him back or if he'd ever even get to _see_ him again and now Miss Ritchi though-

\- _Minion_!

She stood up from her spot and walked- _stalked_ actually _-_ up to him, startling him out of his downwards-spiraling thoughts and back to the present.

After a long moment he remembered to turn his suit so he was facing her properly, almost feeling a bit scared now. He was breathing hard in his agitation and Miss Ritchi looked sort of angry, but he wasn't sure.

(Apart from TV he didn't have _that_ much contact with other people and he didn't trust everything he saw on TV. Some actors were horrible!)

He knew what Miss Ritchi was capable of when she was pissed off, so his arms automatically went across his chest and he clinked his metal fingers together in a nervous gesture, giving her a remorseful look. He knew he hadn't done anything wrong, but he still felt the need to apologize.

\- I _know_ that! That's _not_ what I meant. We both know he's not in _prison_. If you'll let me finish I'll tell you.

She crossed her arms and looked at him as you would a child who knew he'd done something wrong, arching her eyebrows and pursing her lips. He looked so sad she almost lost control of her stern frown. She couldn't stay annoyed with him for even half a minute!

\- Sorry. You were saying...?

\- Yes, I was. Saying.

She gave up and smiled at him, her voice soft again.

\- I was _saying_ that we should talk to the warden and see if he has any more information about Osorto. Maybe there's something in the prison records that doesn't show up here? Old girlfriends, relatives... They're still pretty analog over there and some stuff might be kept only on paper. Besides, Megamind is his most infamous prisoner, he'll probably want to know he's MIA and not just working on something really big.

\- Oh. OH! Yes! Of course! Warden'll want to know, too. And maybe... But- I don't know if he'll let us see any records, even if it is to find Sir. They're... not on very good terms, not since- But it's worth a shot!

\- It's just four thirty. If we hurry he might still be at work.

It was Saturday, but the warden of Metro City Prison for the Criminally Gifted was a dedicated, hands-on kind of man. She suspected he didn't care what day it was if he had work to do. But if they didn't find him there after all, maybe they could get his home address and visit him at his home.

Roxanne grabbed her purse and stood up, ready to go, the pink brainbot hovering close behind, ready for orders.

Roxanne took a look at herself; her clothes were reasonable, nothing she'd wear on-air, but she often did interviews intended only for printing or a voice-over, so she didn't bother to waste time changing. Her make-up was probably okay, she could check it in the car. They were both acutely aware of the ticking clock, even if they didn't mention it.

Minion fluttered his fins in excitement.

This was good. He wouldn't have thought of that. Warden was- not supposed to be discussed in Evil Lair. He thought they had burned that bridge long ago (and they probably had), but this was a special situation.

There was an ice-front between Sir and Warden. Minion usually avoided thinking about him, he didn't like how it ended last time and Sir's mocking of the prison after that didn't exactly help. Besides he was _Sir's_ minion, he'd _always_ take his side.

 _Would Warden help us now?_

He wasn't sure. Warden was a good man, but Minion had said some mean things to him the last time they met. Things that couldn't be taken back. But they had to try. There was nothing he wouldn't do to get Sir back, even if it meant having to own up on the things he'd said to their adoptive father.

He looked down at Miss Ritchi.

\- Do you think we should contact him before just showing up? I'm not sure he'll _want_ to see me without knowing why... Maybe you should-

\- We'll go together, don't be silly, I'll call him when we're on the way and ask for a quick meeting, and until we're in his office you can be my sound-guy, I can't pretend to be going on air like this.

She gestured to herself. Minion couldn't see anything wrong with her outfit, but he agreed that it wasn't something he'd expect her to wear on air.

\- If he doesn't have time right away we'll just wait.

She said it with such an off-hand 'obviously this is how we'll do it' air that Minion just nodded.

He doubted she even noticed how she was taking charge, but he didn't mind. It was comforting actually. It reminded him of Sir. He wasn't a natural leader, he was a _min-In_! He wanted to be _given_ orders and _be_ lead. Being the one _giving_ orders and _leading_ anyone else than the brainbots just made him uncomfortable.

He much preferred it this way.

He turned away from the monitors and followed Miss Ritchi to the car, a real albeit small smile on his face.

* * *

 **And break! I had to cut this in two, I couldn't justify publishing an 11 500 word chapter...**


	8. Some clever title 2

**Metro City Prison for the Criminally Gifted, Saturday afternoon, 4 1/2 weeks missing.**

\- Miss Ritchi.

John Kellem, the warden of Metro City Prison for the Criminally Gifted walks out from behind his desk to take her offered hand and shakes it once with a firm grip.

He's just as gruff as she remembers from her few interviews with him; a blue suit with a simple white shirt underneath, no tie. His hair is more or less grey now, and even her dad never had a mustache _that_ bushy, but it's perfectly trimmed. She can just barely see his smile through it, but it doesn't reach his eyes. He has the look of someone who doesn't sleep well.

His office is simple, just a plain wooden desk with a computer screen, a stack of papers and some pencils, with two mismatching chairs placed in front.

A couple of pictures stands on a corner but from Roxanne's vantage point she can't see what's in the frames. Probably of his family, she assumes. A child's toy of some kind of- abstract- pins and orbs connected in a perfect sphere. It takes her a while to realize it's a 3D-model of some sort of molecule with a smaller molecule inside of it.

It's a strange thing to find on a prison warden's desk.

On the off-white wall to her left there's a fig-tree in need of water in the window corner and three frames displaying diplomas in Criminal Psychology, Juvenile Correction and his graduation with honors from the Detroit Police Academy.

A bookshelf along the opposite wall holds several categories of books, not just the mandatory ones concerning law and order, but also psychology, some science, immigration laws, medical works and a thick one about astronomy along with some pocketbooks.

Weirdly enough, on the bottom shelf, almost flush with the carpeted floor, are three thin children's books. Roxanne thinks it's a strange place to see that type of books, but then she remembers two alien babies have been raised within these walls and the books look less out of place.

* * *

(It was too bad she couldn't run a story on that, but she'd promised Megamind to keep quiet.

He'd made a slip during a kidnapping, mentioned an 'uncle' and then seized up completely. She had relentlessly pressured him to tell her where there were more blue people and finally after an offer of screaming for him next time (off camera) and a vow to never tell anyone he'd given in. She'd had to pull and coax the answers out of him, but he'd talked.

God, his eyes when he told her, even if she _hadn't_ promised she'd never have said anything. He was scared and ashamed and sometimes proud and so sincere he could have told her the sky was green and she would have believed him.

She hadn't gotten many details, but she was certain she knew more than anyone else about the two aliens.)

* * *

\- Warden, Mr Kellem, thank you for seeing us on such short notice. And call me Roxanne.

\- Not a problem, I was just finishing up. Please call me John.

He gives her a scrutinizing stare with the look of an old fox, and then he glances over at her sound-man who's standing just inside the closed door, fiddling with his watch.

He looks like any other guy; worn tennis shoes, washed-out jeans, a green button-shirt over a black t-shirt and a brown leather jacket with it's collar popped. His dark brown hair is cropped short, almost an overgrown military style, he has a gold ring in one ear and a bag of sound equipment slung over his shoulder.

\- Hello Minion, long time.

The soundman almost looses his balance even though he wasn't moving in the first place. His jaw drops and he stammers something unintelligible, blushing furiously, while the warden chuckles.

Roxanne gives him an almost equally surprised look as Minion does.

The disguise he's wearing is close to perfect (she's checked) and only by close study is it possible to find the flaws. The warden has never met Hal in person so he shouldn't know this wasn't Roxanne's usual cameraman and she can't imagine how he could have identified the disguise as Minion so fast.

Out of the two stunned individuals in the office she's the one to first gain control of her voice first. She's used to keeping her wits about her in the face of shock after all.

\- How did you...?

He chuckles louder, the bushy mustache quivering and finally his smile reach his eyes.

\- You think I wouldn't recognize one of my own boys just about anywhere, Miss Ritchi?

\- Boys?

\- Mm... Adopted. Obviously.

\- Obviously.

Adopted? She'd never heard even a _whisper_ of a rumor about them being adopted. How had that escaped anyone's attention?!

She shook herself. She couldn't forget why they were here, no matter how much she wanted to follow that line of questioning. That one word, 'adopted', had created a thousand new questions she wanted to ask him. Instead she put on her best reporter-face and focused on the reason they had come here.

 _Later. Not now. There will be time later._

\- I guess you can turn off the watch, Minion.

A blue ripple and Minion is standing there, making the office suddenly feel barely half the size it was just a second ago.

She glance over at him before giving the warden an apologetic smile.

For a second she thought she'd said something stupid, but then she remembered that a few months ago Megamind had used the watch in an escape that foolishly revealed it's existence to everyone.

\- Sorry we tried to trick you, we _did_ actually plan on telling you who he was before we got started.

\- I don't mind. A lot. I doubt the guards would have let Minion in like that. He might not be a wanted criminal like his boss but he _does_ pose a significant security risk.

He gave Minion a pointed look and the fish had the decency to blush.

\- Not wanted?

John turned his attention back to the reporter.

\- Nope. There's never any proof of him assisting Blue in anything illegal, be it prison breaks or criminal acts. Sure, there's rumors and some pictures, but nothing admissible in court. We have footage of Megamind saying his name and telling him to do things, but there's no way of proving it's _our_ Minion getting the orders, even though we all know it is. And _you_ never file reports for kidnappings either, so that's a dead-end too. Now, would you mind telling me why you're here? You weren't very clear on the phone.

His sudden change in topic had Roxanne's mind spinning again. She wasn't done cataloging questions about their childhood, much less their true status as criminals. She could already tell there was the potential of dozens of interviews, follow-ups, stories... but not yet.

 _Later._

She wasn't sure if she liked John calling Megamind 'Blue' like it was a name, though. That would be like calling an African American 'Black' and sounded incredibly racist. Or would that be 'specieist' in Megamind's case?

The warden didn't seem to notice her quandary and gestured to the chairs before he went back around the desk to his own. Roxanne decided to let it rest until later, maybe ask Minion about it since it didn't seem like he'd minded the name at all. She took a seat in the chair to her right while Minion just took a few steps closer instead of standing by the door, knowing regular wooden chairs had no chance of holding his heavy mechanical gorilla-body.

John leaned back and waited, hands folded on his stomach. He'd learned over the years that he would often get just as much information by being patient than if he started asking right off the bat. It was difficult to ask the right questions when you didn't already know all the facts (at which point you didn't need to ask questions anyway), but let the other do the talking and he'd always get his answers.

He was curious about how the reporter and Minion had come to seemingly work together, but with any luck he'd at least get some hints on that too.

He wouldn't have to wait long. He was slightly bemused that apparently Miss Ritchi was the spokesperson but he also knew she rarely beat around the bush with anything, and wasn't disappointed when she spoke.

\- We need information.

\- What kind of information?

He raised his hands and rested his elbows on the chair's armrests, making a pyramid with his arms.

\- About a former prisoner. Charles Osorto, remember him?

 _The stockbroker? What do they need him for?_

John Kellem wasn't in the habit of remembering details of all his prisoners, but he always made sure to keep close tabs on anyone who might pose a threat to Blue or Minion, and Osorto had openly made several death-threats while under his supervision, even attacked with a shiv once in the exercise yard, but Blue had him floored before the guards had time to react. Before even his _uncles_ had time to react.

If only both aliens had been legally protected he would have prosecuted, but he'd only been able to complete the legal red-tape process for Minion. Everything regarding Blue had been frozen when he'd gotten his first conviction and was still milling around somewhere in the system, impossible to get any headway and since it was already 'under evaluation' he couldn't start the process again with new papers.

\- I remember him. Got out, oooh- three years ago? No, four, as of June this year. Exactly what is it you need, Miss Ritchi?

She'd told him to call her by her first name, but he was old-school. You only called close friends and family by their first names.

\- We got a tip from- an acquaintance, that he might be able to lead us to Megamind. We need his address.

That got John's complete and undivided attention. He sat up and leaned over his desk, staring her in the eye in a 'don't-fuck-with-me' kind of way.

\- You're saying you don't know where he is either? He's _missing_?!

He'd suspected that when they showed up, but had hoped against hope that it was something else. _Anything_ else.

\- Yes. Minion says he's been gone since the evening of his last battle with Metro Man. Nobody's seen him since, and-

At that point Minion spoke up.

\- We think Neerim has him...

Minion trailed off, giving her a wordless 'sorry' for interrupting and decided shutting up would be good now, before Warden went nuclear.

Roxanne had never seen such a shift in mood, not even in Megamind during her kidnappings when his plans were suddenly and unexpectedly foiled.

John's tone when he spoke was a threatening growl as he loomed up behind his desk and placed his hands flat on the surface, pressing down so hard his fingertips turned white, his eyes suddenly dark and fiery.

The whole room seemed to grow colder.

\- Neerim...

A faint 'yes' could be heard from Minion's direction as he shrank back in his bowl.

Roxanne couldn't look away from the papa-bear behind the desk.

\- If that monster has laid _one finger_ on my Blue again... I'll wring his sorry excuse of a neck and shove his so-called 'doctorate' down his throat before locking him in a cell with Jug!

The worried knot that had formed in his chest when they said the didn't know where he was exploded into icy shards and chilled him to the bone. He'd hoped to _never_ hear that name ever again!

When he spoke his voice was low, but it trembled with barely-contained fury while he stared at Roxanne. The entire man was shaking, and Roxanne could easily see how someone who usually looked like an old-ish grandfatherly type could run a prison in a way that resulted in almost no record of riots or fatalities, and except Megamind there had been no escapes during all his years as warden.

She was pretty sure that a visit to the warden's office was an intimidating thing for _any_ wrongdoer in the prison.

Roxanne had made a face again at his use of 'Blue', though, but she realized it sounded more like an affectionate pet-name than an insult. Minion still hadn't said a word about it either, and he was the first to come down on anything even _remotely_ insulting to his boss, and Roxanne doubted the fact that this was the warden would stop Minion from laying down the law.

At first the warden's reaction was surprising. Roxanne wasn't sure what kind of reaction she'd expected, but that raw fury was... actually quite comforting.

She didn't know much about John Kellem, he had never been very talkative about exactly what his relationship with the blue alien in his prison was, but 'adopted' had been pretty revealing. Still, during every press conference he'd talked about Megamind as any other convict, with no hint of any affection between them. Mostly it was 'no comment' but sometimes he had to say a few words after a particularly destructive prison break.

She wonders just how 'adopted' they are. Megamind has spent his entire life more or less in prison. If they'd been _legally_ adopted wouldn't they have been living with John? But he's reacting just like any father in this situation would, so there _has_ to be something there.

Megamind, on the other hand, has always been dismissive of his relationship with his warden, but now she's starting to wonder if that attitude is just another one of his defenses or if it's truly as one-sided as the media and public get to see.

\- Wait here, I'll be right back.

John left his office in a stalk and Roxanne could hear him talking to his clerk outside but not what was said, and then one of them walked down the hall.

Roxanne and Minion was left with a sudden, semi-awkward silence with neither wanting to be the first to speak.

Not five minutes later he comes back in like a devil with a folder half an inch thick. He sits down heavily, places it on his desk and takes a few seconds to get control of himself. His eyes are still dark when he looks up, but he seems calmer, more composed now.

\- This is everything I have on Osorto. It's been backlogged for entry into the database, that's why you haven't found it.

He gave Minion a meaningful look. John knew very well the fish would already have hacked into the prison records, but (assumed) small-timers like Osorto was never a priority. It was much more important to get the big guns, like serial killers, mobsters, other villains, registered so it was accessible for FBI, NSA and the other abbreviation-agencies.

Now it felt like the biggest gun of them all had slipped through the cracks of his system and he had failed in a way there was no forgiveness for.

\- It's a copy, keep it. But on two conditions.

Roxanne waited for him to set his terms.

\- First: if I _ever_ see or hear _anything_ from that folder published I will make sure you never set foot in front of a camera again. When you're done with it, you burn it.

Roxanne was surprised, it sounded like he meant it and that he would have no problem fulfilling his threat, nor hesitate to do it. But she wasn't worried, she wasn't doing any of this to get a story, she'd happily burn it when they had Megamind back so she nodded her agreement and gestured for him to go on.

\- Second...

And then the man just _deflated_.

He sagged back into his chair and somehow looked ten years older in under two seconds. His eyes flitted to one of the pictures and the model on his desk before he leaned over and grabbed one of the frames, sinking back into his chair while staring down at the picture while brushing a thumb over the glass, eyebrows drawing together as he scowled at the picture.

The lacquer on the wooden frame was wearing off on the lower right side.

* * *

It was one of the earlier pictures of the little blue baby that fell from the sky.

He was two years old, sitting on the floor of this very office with Minion in a glass ball on his right and a book on astronomy open in front, pointing at a picture of an artist's rendering of a black hole. His huge green eyes was staring at the camera while silently trying to convey something.

It hadn't been until five years later that John had learned the fate of the Blue's and Minion's home world.

* * *

John closed his eyes and rubbed a hand across his face hard before sighing heavily.

\- Second: when you find him, let me know. I just need to know...

Roxanne was surprised at how tired he suddenly looked while Minion noted he'd said 'when', not 'if', and that raised his spirit considerably. The old man still had faith at least.

They _would_ find him, no question, but alive? Minion couldn't help but feel time was running out faster than they were making progress. He knew Sir was still alive, but for how much longer?

John carefully put the frame back where it belonged and adjusted the model-molecule Blue had made him for Father's Day at age four, before crossing his arms on the desk, leaning heavily on them while looking up at Miss Ritchi.

\- Just let me know. And then burn that folder, I'm not really allowed to let it leave the compound, but...

He shrugged.

\- We will. Thank you for helping us.

\- I'm not doing it for you. He's my kid. I want him back. If there's anything else I can do, let me know.

And back was the gruff warden who didn't gloss things over, and clearly he considered the meeting as concluded.

Roxanne stood up to leave, guessing the warden wanted some time alone.

\- Of course, thank you, for both your time and your help.

They had apparently dropped a bomb on the man, he'd been convinced Megamind was just up to something huge, she was sure. And the way he'd talked about the alien- he cared about Megamind, or 'Blue', that much was certain. He was worried like any father would be.

She shook his hand, put the folder in her purse before closing it and turned to leave. She noted Minion was delaying by the plant so she closed the door behind her without waiting for the henchfish, leaving him alone with the warden. They clearly had some things to talk about in private.

* * *

While waiting for Minion to finish she asked the clerk about a restroom, then when she was finished in there she found a coffee machine that offered tea.

She picked something herbal and settled down to wait, making sure to resist leafing through the folder hidden in her purse since the clerk could see her. John may be the boss around here, but she didn't want anyone to blow the whistle and get him in trouble for helping them. The folder could wait until they were back in the car.

Instead she used the time to organize her thought about everything she'd learned about Megamind, and by extension Minion, buring the twenty minutes they were in there, making use of her ever-present notebook.

Just a few minutes after finishing her half-warm cup of tasteless tea Minion, now appearing to be her soundman again, emerged from the warden's office, suspiciously glassy eyed (even for a fish in a bowl under a holographic disguise). She heard him say bye and then head towards her, already having the car keys in his hand.

It took them almost fifteen minutes to exit, since they needed to retrieve some of their belongings that were not allowed inside the building, even if they were just visiting the office-wing.

The guard had raised an eyebrow at Roxanne's small knife and pepper spray but didn't inquire about any concealed permit. Minion had had to leave some dangerous-looking cords for the sound equipment he'd brought to appear more genuine.

When safely in the car Roxanne dove straight into the folder. An added bonus of having her nose in the papers was that she didn't have to see how Minion was weaving in and out of traffic like a madman, dodging trucks, aiming straight through intersections and coasting between cars stopped by red lights, nearly clipping mirrors.

She didn't miss everything, though, and she felt a little guilty for the poor guy coming behind them when Minion completely ignored a change of speed limit just before a speed-trap. The driver would get a nasty fine in the mail, even if the license plate of his vehicle was a bit distorted and far back in the picture.

The fact that their car was _invisible_ wasn't enough to fool a trap that used laser. Even though the car was out of the _visible_ spectrum didn't mean it wasn't _there_. There was still substance for the laser to be reflected off, you just couldn't _see_ it.

She couldn't feel too bad, though, the other driver _had_ been speeding too, just not as bad as Minion.

* * *

 **Outside Metro City, day 1.**

Megamind jerks on the bed when he hear the chink of keys outside, and a click follows when they unlock the door. He wonders briefly if he should get out of bed and give them a proper greeting or just ignore them. He wants to get up, but he's not sure his legs will hold him. He hadn't expected such a strong reaction but he can feel them shaking even though he's still on the bed.

Better avoid the risk of showing any weakness, so he keeps his eyes closed, breathing slow and relaxed, for all appearances sleeping like a rock, even though his heart is beating so hard now it feels like it's about to break through his rib-cage any second and go skipping across the floor.

He knew they'd come get him eventually, but that didn't mean he had to look _forward_ to it. He's pretty sure he knows what's coming and he'd rather avoid that if he could, thank-you-very-much.

Someone is talking outside the door, so there would be at least two of them. Whoever 'they' are. He doubts Doc would come get him himself. He always left the 'dirty work' for his underlings before and Megamind can see no reason for his habits to have changed.

The door opened almost without a sound.

They must have oiled the hinges or that old door would have screeched like a flock of huge, angry bats.

Megamind feels himself frowning and tensing up and hurries to school his face into a relaxed expression again, before they can spot it.

There's the sound of fabric rustling, it sounds like someone gesturing orders, trying to be quiet. Definitely two then, not just one with a radio.

A rubber-soled boot steps just inside the door and stops. Whoever it is is probably studying him, trying to see if he's pretending (which he is) or if it's safe to approach (which it isn't). He almost expects the person to poke him with a stick or something.

Oh, he hope they would! Then he could show them how useful a stick could be!

But no, after a long moment he had no such luck. The sound of a few more steps, (a large person, he guesses about 370 pounds give or take), and then the person is all the way inside his- _the_ cell, somewhere by the foot-end of h- _the_ bed.

( _Nothing_ in here is his. He doesn't plan on setting foot inside this room again after they take him out of it!)

He can hear more sounds from outside now and it surprises him there's so many. He thought they were two, one inside and one outside, but now he can hear at least five!

He isn't sure if he should feel flattered or annoyed.

On one hand they obviously knew he was dangerous, they took him seriously. On the other hand it was annoying to have so many to deal with. It could make things messy and unpredictable.

No matter, he just has to use the hand he's dealt. He can take down five, but this time they're armed. He can smell the unique scent of quality gun-oil.

\- Get up!

 _Oh, cheery today, aren't we?_

Megamind mentally rolls his eyes. Every single thug was like this. Thought they would sound tough and 'don't mess with me' if they just half-shouted and sounded angry. Definitely not working.

\- No. I haven't had my twelve hours yet. Come back later.

(Haha, like he's slept for more than four hours in one go in his entire _life_!)

He keeps his tone matter-of-factly and dismissive, solely to tick them off. One of them would probably manhandle him up, but then they'd all get a surprise.

Instead it was Megamind who was in for a surprise.

Nobody lays a finger on him, the guy by the end of his bed simply pulls the thin mattress off, with Megamind still on it, making him take a rather inelegant tumble to the floor.

\- I said 'get up'!

Megamind stands, deliberately slowly, brushing himself off with a face that say 'I'm gravely insulted, you will hear from my attorney!', and even with the thug a good foot and a half taller than himself Megamind still manages to look down his nose at him.

It was a look he perfected when he was still barely a teenager. He was _always_ the shortest one (still often was) but had made a reputation for himself early, and being able to look _down_ on someone was a bigger deal in the criminal underworld than one would think!

(He's been pretty close with the goon's estimated weight, unfortunately it doesn't look like an ounce of those 385 pounds is fat).

\- And _I_ said 'come back later'. Is your hearing impaired or is it just your feeble human brain that's unable to comprehend the meaning of my words?

He's quite proud of the tone he manages to use. It's pure arrogance and though he's never been a coward this whole situation is stretching his nerves to the braking point.

He makes a move to get back in bed, ignoring the towering goon, but before he can take another step there's the tell-tale sound of a gun being cocked behind his back.

So, now there were a few scenarios that could play out.

Megamind could spin around, grab a hold of the gun-arm, dislodge the thug's shoulder, disarm and disable him and face the four in the hallway armed but cornered.

Or he could let himself be led out at gunpoint. They would probably have one on each side of the door, one covering from a distance and one... maybe they were two covering? He could take out the two by the door relatively fast, going for knees and necks while making sure the one behind him didn't shoot him in the back. The one or two giving cover would be more tricky, he'd have to gamble they all had guns he could steal and he'd probably have to wound them, maybe even kill, and he'd rather avoid that.

Third option was to play nice with the big boys for now, let them take him wherever they were heading and hope for an opportunity along the way.

He's bound to get a chance somewhere and he can make due with very little when he needs to.

He decides to go with option number three. It's the plan most likely to get him out of here alive. And the _alive_ part he considers reasonably important.

His entire evaluation- and decision process has taken about the time he use to stop in his track when he heard the gun cock.

There is no way for anyone to know exactly how much information he can process in the blink of an eye. The human brain just didn't capable to understand the concept of how fast he can think or how radically different his brain is, and so they always underestimate his ability to assess a situation, calculate possible outcomes and make a decision based on the potential for success.

With a dramatic sigh he turns around while rolling his eyes.

\- Oh fine, _fine_! If you insist!

(His cape would have flared beautifully with that turn!)

He gives the goon a holier-than-thou look and crosses his arms, waiting for Mr Tough-Guy to make a move while trying to tell his blood to stop making that rushing sound in his ears.

Megamind doesn't have to wait long. The gun jerks in a 'get going' kind of way so he starts walking to the door, making sure to take in any and all information he can along the way.

There are indeed two guys waiting on each side of the door, plus one about five yards away doing the covering and one by the first door half-way down the hallway.

Mr Tough-Guy gives Megamind a shove to keep him moving. The Doormen fall in behind them while Cover and Backup stays where they are until Megamind get closer, then they fall in in front. That means Megamind has one pointing a gun at his back, two behind that, also armed, and two in front.

He's boxed in.

Again.

Just like outside Frank's, only this time he's in a cramped corridor barely two meters wide, still five thugs but this time they are armed with guns. And was that a taser under Cover's jacket?

Megamind isn't sure if he should be delighted or distressed by that detail.

Tasers were great in close-combat, but only as long as _he's_ the one wielding it. He's been on the business end several times before and it's far from pleasant! Getting tasered does funny things to his body and leaves a weird watermelon-taste at the back of his mouth for hours after, and he _hates_ watermelon. It's _pink_!

But if he could get his hands on one of them... He need to be patient and hides an expectant smile.

* * *

The hallways themselves aren't much of a surprise. Just bare concrete like his cell, illuminated by fluorescent light that flickers and hums with the age of the electric system. Such a clichè that he can't help but make a derisive sound at the whole thing.

The noise earns him a warning jab in the back.

He knows of course he's in danger, but he can't just roll over and wait to die either, and the supervillain in him refuses to show any kind of vulnerability. Instead he responds like he would with any human thinking they have the upper hand; he treats them with contempt and acts like he was the one in charge. Chin up, a purposeful stride, a slight smile, pretending to know where he's going

He's great at holding a mask.

The guy behind him nudges the barrel of the gun into the back of his neck again, pushing him forward, as if he's not walking fast enough. It's blatantly obvious it's just a display of power.

The cold metal touching his exposed skin still sends a shiver down his back and make goosebumps erupt down his arms and shoulders, but Megamind refuses to acknowledge it. He really miss his high collar right now.

He turns his head and gives Mr Tough-Guy an exasperated glare. All he get in response is another, harder shove with the barrel.

There's a lot of guns pointing at him now, and at least two of his guards have tactical knives hanging from black belts.

 _At least it's not Swiss army knives..._

He almost snickers at that image, imagining how they'd look with little red folding knives instead.

Suddenly his attention is stolen by the sound of a door opening and closing, and a few seconds later the quality of the air changes subtly, getting fresher for a few seconds before returning to that stale quality that smells like all moist, disused basements did.

The sound had come from down the hall, most likely to the left, but the echo could be fooling him.

There's at least one door between him and the potential exit, but he suspects that it's an ordinary interior door since the draft had carried all the way to him.

He needs to get out as soon a possible and now he eyes a chance. The stakes are high, the men could easily shoot him if he just run; there's nothing to use as cover between him and the door. He has to decide fast, who knows when he'll get another chance.

 _Doc wants me alive. I'm sure of it._

If the crazy man wants him alive his guards has probably gotten orders to contain him only, and not use deadly force... But the key word there was 'probably'...

They _have_ guns, but are they even loaded? He knows they're real, not just realistic replicas, nobody oils replicas.

There's only five guards. Megamind knows he can take them down and he'll make sure _everyone_ is down this time. He will _not_ make the same mistake as he did earlier and just hope. But he has to assume the guns are loaded and that they'll use them if it gets out of hand.

He's fast, his reflexes much faster than a human's. If he waits until Cover and Backup have passed the door and make his move _before_ his Doormen is past the door he'll only have to worry about Mr Tough Guy, and he's easily disabled.

It shouldn't take more than a couple of seconds and the usual response time for expected things are 0.2 seconds in humans. That leaves 1.8 seconds for them to draw, aim and pull the trigger while making sure they don't hit their buddy in the process. Cover and Backup also have to turn around which adds to their response time, and the Doormen will have Mr Tough-Guy between themselves and Megamind.

He likes the odds.

All possible scenarios plays out in his mind, most likely to remotely possible alike, every way for this to turn out and his chances in each scenario.

They took the last few steps and Cover and Backup stepped up alongside the door.

The barely 150 pound unarmed, barefoot alien prepared to take down a 385 pound thug armed with a firearm, quite possibly a taser and knife in a cramped hallway backed up by four equally armed if not quite as large gunmen.

The two in front steps past the door and five paces later Megamind tensed.

* * *

Mr Tough-Guy didn't know what hit him. One second he was escorting the blue freak down the hall at gunpoint, just like his orders from the doctor detailed, and the next second his gun was gone, his nose was bleeding furiously and he was staggering backwards from a kick, _a kick,_ to his throat!

And just like that the alien was through the door they'd just been passing!

* * *

The simple, wooden door slams shut behind Megamind so hard the latch doesn't even engage, so it swing partly open again.

Megamind race down the new hallway, bare feet smacking against the concrete floor and echoing off the walls, giving him great acceleration. He's so high on adrenaline he doesn't even notice when a little piece of broken lightbulb cuts into his left foot, making him leave little bloody imprints in his wake.

Several doors along the walls goes unnoticed.

He's heading for that enchanting green light in the far end of the corridor, showing the word 'EXIT'. Thank evil heaven for fire safety regulations!

His heart is racing, but now it's in anticipation of his glorious freedom and a future _rehvaunge_ so splendid they would have to make room in the Oxford Dictionary for an example of 'perfection' (right beside his own incredibly handsome face), instead of that cold dread he'd had in his bones just minutes earlier.

So close! The corridor is long, at least thirty-fourty meters, possibly running the entire length of whatever building he's in.

Megamind is fast but it still seems to be going too slow. It feels like everything is moving in slow-motion but he's almost half-way before his escorts even opens the door he slammed in their faces.

A thundering crack suddenly echoes down the hall and Megamind makes an instinctive dive for cover that just isn't there.

This hallway is just as bare as the others.

He rolls to the wall, somehow having turned around so he's lying with his feet to his goal. He's breathing hard and has a wild expression when he lifts his head to check on his pursuers, eyes as wide as they go and panting through an open mouth.

He's scraped an elbow and his knee is aching from the impact with the floor. He's not used to this kind of activity without his protective villain-suit so he's been careless, but by now he's running on instinct so he doesn't really notice.

It's only about ten seconds since he jumped up and kicked Mr Tough-Guy in the throat, and humans are notorious for slow reactions, but these guys are actually pretty good.

One of the smaller ones is still standing with his arms out in front of him, and it takes just a fraction of a second for Megamind to recognize the Weaver position, barrel already lowered after a shot having been fired. They probably assumed he'd been hit when he went to the floor.

There's shouts in the other end, and he thinks he heard something like 'give me that' but he can't care less. The exit is so tantalizingly close, he _has_ to take the chance!

He leaps back on his feet, the echo of a gun being reloaded reach him just as his hand touch the push-bar of the heavy, fireproof door. He doesn't even take the time to hope it was unlocked. It's an _emergency_ exit, it's not supposed to _be_ locked. It opens outwards, of course, and just as it swing open two more cracks in quick succession reverberate through the hall.

Megamind isn't even across the threshold when he feel two impacts, one in his right shoulder and one in his lower back almost perfectly centered, sparking off a white-hot agony running up his spine and momentarily shorting out his brain, making him see spots.

He's propelled through the door by the force of both the impacts and his own speed. He end up gasping for breath on a small landing in front of a staircase leading up to a door with a window. It all happens so fast he doesn't even have time to cry out in surprise!

Daylight is shining through the little window, so close it's a mockery to him because he can't for the life of him get up. The heavy sound of the door automatically swinging closed reminds him of the cell doors in the prison.

He's not sure if he's lucky to _not_ have cracked his head on the first step.

He doesn't have time to ponder the cruel twists fate deals him, though.

The first sharp wave of pain rolls through him and then that funny, numb sensation of just being _wrong_ in places is all he can feel.

When the pain-fog lifts he realize can't feel his legs and he can barely catch a breath, his burning lungs stubbornly refusing to inflate and leaving him with a feeling like drowning. He desperately tries to get up, it's just seven steps and he'll be by the exit, but with lungs out of commission and legs he can't feel it's a hopeless struggle and he's suddenly aware of the crackling cold fire of terror inside him reaching out for him through his walls...

A few seconds later he's on his right side, his head only a few inches from the stairs. Did he black out?

His left arm goes to his stomach, expecting to find blood, because oh, right, he's been shot in the back. _Twice_!. There _have_ to be blood. There's no way those shots isn't through-and-through, not from such a short distance.

Oddly enough he can't feel anything wet and he's not light-headed as would be expected after getting shot twice. He can't smell any blood and his pulse isn't speeding up as it would have done if he suffered significant blood-loss, which is- really strange...

Things just isn't adding up! His mind _is_ fuzzy, just not the right kind of fuzzy, he's supposed to be dying right about now but-

Oh thank science, he's not going to die!

Stopping power without killing power! Genius! He's going to _kiss_ whoever made these bullets when he- Oh fuck, he's _not_ dying.

That clever sadistic bastard...

He can hear the door open again and a pair of boots steps in front of him as he's still lying on his side, trying to fight the returning feelings of desperation and loss.

He keeps his eyes closed, he doesn't want to see.

He's stuck. He can't get up, he can't fight and he will never get out of here.

But even in that dark pit of hopelessness a tiny spark of defiance still lives. He's never been one to give up easily and that spark denies him to do it now.

He opens his eyes and looks up at the lead goon, trying for a smug look but failing miserably. But at least he tried.

\- Rubber bullets...

He just barely manages to make his voice composed and stable, he need what dignity he can retain while wheezing on a floor being surrounded by men who wants to hurt him. It's too much like a an episode when he was eight and attending shool and he'd rather get this over with.

\- Correct. I guess you are a genius after all. Nice try by the way, you almost made it!

The goon gave him a smirk, and Megamind realized this had probably been _intentional_. They had _wanted_ him to try. It was part of the process trying to break him and he should have expected it! The exit on top of the stairs was probably locked and guarded too.

 _Stupid, stupid..._

Giving hope and then brutally smashing it.

More boots are approaching and Megamind feels someone behind his back. He _really_ wants to turn around to see, he hates not having full control 360 degrees around himself, but he really doesn't want to let Mr Tough-Guy out of his line of sight. He's obviously the boss of the five, so any orders will be coming from him and Megamind doesn't want to miss anything.

He still has a chance as long as he's not unconscious.

The big guy is wearing a smug look of anticipation. That look does nothing to soothe his already fraying nerves, and Megamind hears the shuffle of someone crouching down behind him.

 _Well that can't be good-_

A click and the smell of ozone is all the warning he gets before two sparking electrodes is jabbed against the back of his neck.

* * *

 **I know, I** ** _know_** **, I'm being awful to him! Poor Megs, and it's not even close to over yet! Don't hate me! For an explanation see my profile! (It's just one line, haha).**

 **A human can survive about three days without water. Megamind is an alien so he'll manage just over a week so long as he doesn't eat.**

 **The 3D-molecure on the warden's desk is four-year-old Megamind's model of a potassium-doped bucky-ball, the stuff his space-pod was made of. The potassium-bucky-ball is a superconductive material at certain temperature and was used for both strength and power for life-support in the pod, feeding of solar radiation and interstellar radiation on the journey. (A large dose of wild imagination was used on the** ** _properties_** **of the potassium-bucky-balls, but the molecules themselves, even the part of one inside the other, is real and quite fascinating! And they are superconductive, but at about 18 000 Kelvin or so).**

 **I have no idea if 'quality' gun-oil smells any different from the regular stuff I use, but let's just roll with it!**


	9. Long awaited backup

**I did it... I DID IT! *mad cackle* The next chapter! I published! I know it's been long but, yeah, my inspiration went on vacation to the deep, central Amazon, got kidnapped by a pack of wild boars, rescued by a flock of dwarf elephants and lived with them for a while before falling into the river and washed up later on the beaches of Portugal.**

 **But it came back!**

 **Again a big thanks to Psychochiquita and MegsForEVA1 for amazing help and support. Love ya!**

 **Oh, and since this story turned out to be a fucking can of worms instead of the 6-7 simple chapters I thought it would be, I'm changing the title! To something more suitable. But not yet, The New Thing will be my working title and I'll officially change it when the it's done, however long that'll be...**

 **Hope you like!**

* * *

 **Metro City Prison for the Criminally Gifted, Saturday, 4 1/2 weeks missing.**

An hour after Minion and the reporter had left, warden John Kellem had ordered a prisoner to be brought to his office.

It wasn't unheard of for an inmate to have a private meeting with the warden. All the inmates had something to discuss with Kellem at some point, be it inside information of the goings-on between the prisoners, or insignificant things like how the mattress was too thin, and a lot would just do it as a normal meeting in his office.

What had every inmate talking now was the fact that _Jugs_ had been granted an office meeting.

Any time the warden had needed to talk with him, or vice versa, it had been in a high-security visitation room, with dividing Plexiglas-walls and guards by the door.

In all the years Jugosh 'Juggernaut' Yevyeni had been a 'guest' at the facility he had never set foot in the office wing, and nobody could understand why the sudden change of routine.

* * *

The warden had known he would have to tell Jugs about Blue's disappearing act, and it wasn't a conversation he'd looked forward to.

Jugs could be an unpredictable brute, going off at the strangest things, and there was no guarantee that he wouldn't jump John himself for- selling Blue, or something preposterous like that.

But, instead of the nuclear blast Kellem expected there was- nothing.

Well, almost nothing.

To anyone who didn't know Jugs it would appear as if he didn't give a rat's ass about anyone gone missing. The huge man didn't look like he'd just been told the blue baby alien he'd helped take care of and later seen grow up into a supervillain couldn't be found.

But that was if you didn't know what to look for.

John Kellem knew better though.

He had known Jugs for almost thirty years now, and knew very well what a good actor the man could be, but even he couldn't hide everything.

John could see his blue-gray eyes darken a shade. His bearded jaw tensed, making the vein just over his temple stand out and the scar giving a slight pull on his eye as his breathing started coming in slow, very deliberate breaths.

\- How long?

\- Five weeks on Thursday.

Jugs turned a shade darker in the face, but his voice was as black as the deepest part of Hell and the Devil himself would cower in a corner when Jugs spoke.

\- I need out.

And there it was.

The moment John knew would come had arrived.

The point in time that he, John Kellem, the warden of Metro City Prison for The Criminally Gifted, decided whether he was going to be a lawman, making sure the law was upheld at any cost... or a father.

\- There's a new employee starting tonight. He won't know you're not allowed into the workshop. He, like everyone except you and I, also won't know about the five minutes after ten pm tonight that the surveillance system will need a reboot because of an unexpected glitch.

Jugs did nothing but stare at the warden with a searching, dark look. John was used to getting all kinds of filthy, hostile and downright hateful looks from his inmates, but what Jugs was giving him now was something he rarely received from a prisoner; a grudging dawn of respect and not a small amount of- was that humor?

 _Well… That's a new one._

He buzzed the guard and had Jugs taken back to his cell, not another word needed between the two men.

John was pretty sure they'd see the first successful jailbreak in years tonight, not committed by an alien.

It went against everything he believed in and everything he _logically_ knew was right, but he didn't deserve to call himself a father if he didn't do whatever was in his power to help get his boy back again.

And if that meant helping a convicted hit-man, mobster, enforcer and murderer walk out the prison doors...

Well, then... that's just how it had to be, wasn't it?

 _To hell with it, they'll need all the help they can get._

During the count at eleven pm that night the alarm was sounded and lock-down was put in effect when it was discovered the prison was missing one inmate.

* * *

 **Outside Metro City, day 1**

His world came back in flashes and light and the taste of watermelons crawling down his dry throat, sticking to the roof of his mouth.

His entire body ached, shoulders and lower back in particular. He felt like he'd just gone through another epic battle with Metro Mug but the brute had forgotten to turn down his strength.

 _What the hell happened?_

He opened his eyes, careful of any stabbing lights, not moving anything else, and discovered he was looking down at his own bare feet sticking out of what looked like one of those ugly hospital gowns, planted on a cold concrete floor.

 _Huh... Weird…_

This wasn't usually the position he woke up if he'd been taken out in a battle, whether he escaped capture or not. What had been the plot of the day?

As more parts of his still-groggy brain reactivated, pictures started flickering through his mind at a steadily increasing speed until he remembered again.

 _Oooooh, right..._

The rude wake-up, the walk through the hallways, how he flattened Mr Tough-Guy (heeehehe...), the escape attempt that could have been- a _tad_ more successful...

A numbness in his fingers made him aware of pins and needles prickling along his arms and shoulders under the coarse fabric. His arms were tied behind his back, pulling his shoulders all the way back, making them fall asleep.

His forearms were tied parallel, wrapped together from his elbows to his wrists with a semi-smooth rope or narrow cargo straps, and secured to a horizontal strut in the back of his metal chair, pulling his shoulders into an uncomfortable but at least for now not painful position.

Tied up like this he didn't have any freedom of movement at _all_.

He swallowed hard, trying to get rid of the watermelon-taste even if he knew it wouldn't help, and barely managed to stifle a low groan as he tried to roll his stiff shoulders, settling for baring his teeth in a silent hiss instead.

It wasn't tight enough to stop blood-flow to his tingly fingers, but he still felt the restraints digging into his skin every time he moved a muscle.

He could move his hands, but there was nothing to grab on to and nothing to help him free himself.

The way he was tied down was a disturbingly safe way to ensure the chance for escape was minimal, even for an escape artist like him.

Sure, he could see sixteen different ways of immobilizing Doc and what was presumably a guard he could see a blurred outlining of outside, but without any freedom of movement he had no way of _getting out of the damn chair in the first place_!

His feet were secured to the floor with handcuffs (a fact his brain for some bizarre reason found immensely funny), one on each ankle clipped to a solid-looking eye-bolt driven straight into the floor, the sharp metal already warmed by his body heat.

Megamind scanned the room without moving.

Every detail was noted, from how one table leg had three pieces of cardboard under it to stabilize it on the uneven floor to the way the doctor, wearing too-bright white, held his shoulders in that nervous-but-eager way, and filing away any and all information that could prove useful.

The white-clad doctor stood only a few meters away directly in front of Megamind, but he had his back turned at the moment, writing something in an old, leather-bound journal while leaning his elbow on one of three shiny, stainless-steel tables.

The tables ran along the three walls Megamind could see without moving and were full of notebooks, papers, a state-of-the-art microscope on the right-hand one, while 57 beakers, test tubes and Erlenmeyer flasks were neatly stacked according to type and size on the one to his left. No doubt the cabinets below held things like bunsen-burners and other large lab appliances.

There was a small but expensive-looking centrifuge at the end of one table next to the Meiji-brand microscope he knew for a fact had a listing price of over 8000 USD (since he'd stolen six of them once), and one overhead light on a movable arm, now folded together on the left wall, had to be high-end; a cluster of 58 bright blue-white LEDs in the center surrounded by a wider ring of violet-looking ones, two LEDs deep.

 _UV-light?_

All the equipment, including the tables, appeared new, painstakingly organized in an OCD kind of way, not at all like the organized chaos he like himself and that sometimes drove Minion nuts.

In the corner to his left was a sleek-looking computer cabinet with several external hard-drives plugged into all available USB-ports. No less than three screens were displaying a few anatomical diagrams and graphs, something that looked like the result-part of a thesis and six pictures of brain-scans on a split-screen.

The three on the left seemed to be of an average human, but the ones to the right Megamind recognized immediately, sending chills down his spine in a wave of goose-bumps and a spiky stone was dropped into his stomach.

He could still remember the day those scans were done. Every painful, panicky second of it. And he wasn't likely to forget it any time soon.

 _Yeah, nope, not thinking about that now, let's rather-_

He turned his eyes away from the screens and tried instead to sneak a peek behind himself, still leaning forward as if unconscious with his head lowered, even though his muscles were screaming for him to move, both to distract his own mind from that old reminder, and to gather the last bits of information he might glean from his surroundings.

In the back of his mind plans were made, inventions based of the things he could see, just to keep more of his mind busy and not go spiraling down that old, familiar, dark staircase.

(He mentally made a little robot that could warm a cup of coffee instantly while standing on it's head, he started on a scanner for brain activity but abandoned that quickly since it reminded him too much of what was on the screens and instead modified it to a plasmonic light-concentrating device, plus five other useful and less useful distractions.

And it kept his mind from going through all the possible fates for him being here. With Doc. Tied to a chair.)

Despite all the high-quality, shiny equipment and bright lights, the space he was trapped in gave off an air of a dilapidated run-down reject, not suitable for anything but mold and rats. Even through the watermelon he could taste the spores of gods knew how many species of mold on his tounge.

The floor was rough concrete with small pits inexpertly filled in not long ago, and stained everywhere. It was covered with plastic that wrinkled in all the corners and had caught and ripped in the little wheel of an office chair shoved into a corner.

The plastic ceiling stretched over a metal scaffolding was littered with small and large puddles of water, and at least three drops plopped onto it, even though they were inside, in a /basement/, as he looked at it from the corner of his eye, slowly slowly turning his head just enough to get a glimpse.

The walls were more plastic, but opaque, reflecting some of the light from the overhead fluorescent hanging from the scaffolding.  
The bright light inside the plastic room made the outside invisible, sort of like how one-way glass worked, and gave no further indication of what this building once was.

Yet this was where Doc had decided to set up shop?

The impression was- contradictory. Disconcerting. Paradoxical.

And Megamind didn't like it at all, his gut-feeling screaming at him what he already knew.

That this was Wrong and that he was in Danger!

Not the normal 'oh no, Metro Monkey is coming for me *look appropriately worriiiiied... now!*'-sort of danger, but the kind of danger that meant one wrong move could leave him gasping for air in a fraction of a second and begging to die.

A sound of movement and an excited yell.

\- Six!

* * *

 **Evil Lair, Sunday, 4 1/2 weeks missing.**

\- Well that was a fucking waste of time!

Roxanne slammed the car door shut and stalked across the dark, echoing parking area in the lair, heels clicking sharply on the floor, fuming like a blown radiator at an entire morning lost to dead-ends and stupid drones who didn't know _shit_.

Not even the now-familiar, strangely comforting, ever-present smell of motor-oil and hot steel permeating the lair helped her mood at the moment.

She needed to move! Get out some of that nervous energy that rippled through her and sending her thoughts racing down ten different paths at once.

A part of her mind was always on the blue alien and she shuddered at the horrifying images her wayward imagination bombarded her with now.

She could feel time running out! It was in her bones! They had to find him, fast, or she was convinced she'd never get to see him again!

The ten ton rock that thought dropped in her stomach made her falter in her stalk, gasping as a physical pain stabbed through her chest.

Since when had she become so attached to the alien god-damn _supervillain_ who had kidnapped her every single month for the last six years?!

Deep down, Roxanne knew she could tell herself all she wanted that it was just her habituation of having him in her life that had her concerned.

And she would be lying through her teeth.

She recognized the need to acknowledge that her feelings for the villain was far from the initial annoyance and exasperation she'd felt in the beginning of their 'relationship'. Over the years it had evolved into- something, a weird sort of friendship, because she hadn't lied when she told Minion she considered them her friends, but now... she wasn't sure what it was anymore...

She wanted him in her life, one way or another, she just hadn't admitted to herself how important that was until the threat of _not_ having him there reared it's ugly head.

A wall rose in her path out of nowhere, covered in rough, wooden shelves overflowing with anything from single screws to complete robotic arms and she stopped, but just because her instincts told her legs to not walk straight into it.

She stared at it without seeing it for a good two minutes.

Down the middle, half-way dividing the shelves, ran a half-rusty pipe. The shelves had been built around it, just notches cut into the wood, and she thought she could hear the faint rushing of water.

The absence of manic laughter in the vast building was deafening.

She glowered at the pipe for rudely disrupting the shelves. The shelves she was sure Megamind had made. Made with his bare hands.

Perhaps as a 'fuck you' to her, the pipe decided at that point to gurgle and burp like a dead-drunk walrus in a rude dismissal.

\- Oh fuck you too!

She wheeled away from the wall, frustrated tears forced back, and made her way towards the kitchen.

* * *

Minion winced at how the door slammed shut when Miss Ritchi exited the car.

With great care he extracted himself from the unique Hudson and gathered the groceries from the back seat before shuffling his way towards the kitchen go get lunch started.

He tried to ignore how his echoing footsteps made Evil Lair feel more desolate with each step, more abandoned than it had felt even before they moved in, as long as his clunking footfalls wasn't accompanied by his boss' laughter or aggravated yelling at an invention that didn't do what it was supposed to.

Even the brainbots' 'bowg'-ing had an unnatural, hollow resonance to it now.

Fish didn't cry but Minion still couldn't stop his lip from trembling or his breaths coming is stuttering gulps.

He had failed.

His boss, his best friend, his only family!

What if he never got to see Sir again?!

He was a horrible minion! He was useless. Worthless! He didn't deserve to call himself a _min'in_! If- 'when!' he thought savagely at himself- he got Sir back he would- he would-

Well, he would probably never let Sir exit the building ever again, not without a swarm of 3000 brainbots as bodyguard.

He squeezed his eyes shut against the sudden tightness in his throat, stopping in the middle of a step, the vast desolation of Evil Lair sucking the warmth from his water and body.

The moment dragged.

Minion fell deeper inside his mind until he hit something that wasn't the bottom. The mental jolt was enough to wake him from his momentary petrification, enough to give himself a shake and claw his way out of the desperate mire he had tried to stay out of since this all started.

It was getting harder every day.

(What he'd said to Miss Ritchi was true; he would never stop looking)

Deep breath.

Deep breath.

 _I need to replace Sir's star-flower…_

Deep breath…

Extra oxygen flowing over his gills helped. Finally Minion felt like he wouldn't break down if he moved again, so he started to drift towards the kitchen, if only so the tuna wouldn't spoil.

Small victories.

Cooking lunch might help lighten his bordering hopelessness for a short time, so when he stepped into the kitchen-

He almost let the bags of groceries go clattering to the tiled floor, because-

\- Glowstick!

The huge man with a prickly-looking 4-day shadow and bald like the moon rumbled, flinging his arms wide, sending a brainbot, still clutching a coffee pot, spinning. A huge grin was trying to split his face in two and blue-grey eyes twinkled at the stunned face Minion was offering.

\- It's been too long! How come ya never visit?

Minion froze. His voice caught in his throat as the zings of- shock, surprise, elation- shooting down his spine was easily drowned out by the all-consuming awareness that EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE OKAY EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY BECAUSE UNCLE JUGS IS HERE AND HE WILL FIX EVERYTHING!

\- …Unl... Juh…

In a numb daze he put the bags down on the counter, purely from muscle memory, and had to support his robotic body on his way around the kitchen island.

Finally it clicked.

\- UNCLE JUGS!

Minion rushed forward the last few steps with a scream, grabbed the huge man around the waist and lifted him clear of the ground in a HUG.

And stayed like that, squishing his face hard against the glass of his bowl, trying to get as close as possible to _Uncle Jugs uncle Jugs oh my god uncle Jugs is here oh my god_!

\- You're here! You're- how did you get here?! When?!

\- Walked out the door, found a car, took a drive... Did have some trouble finding your door, though, you've moved it since last time.

Even after putting his uncle back on the floor Minion couldn't make his hands move completely away from his uncle's shoulders, lest he was just a mirage and disappeared.

Minion didn't trust himself enough yet to be sure he wasn't just seeing things, even though the bio-metric sensors in his suit sent him the sensation of rough fabric from the ugliest button-down shirt he'd ever set his eyes on, stretched to the breaking-point across uncle Jugs's broad shoulders.

Maybe- maybe he was dreaming. He could be, maybe he fell asleep somewhere, gods knew he hadn't gotten much much of that the last few weeks...

\- I- we… yeah, we- had some… problems… You're really here?

\- Heh, yeah, Glowstick, I'm really here.

Jugs gave a genuine smile at the fishy kid who still hadn't remembered to close his toothy jaw, and smacked a large hand on his furry shoulder.

\- Ol' Warden opened the door for me himself!

\- That's… really…

 _Warden?_

\- Right! Yes! Um-

Uncle Jugs had already gotten coffee, thanks to 386 who was still hovering in a corner with the coffee pot, looking a little miffed.

\- Hungry! I mean- are you hungry? You must be, I'm making! Lunch! Yes!

Minion shooed Jugs out of the cooking area and motioned for him to sit on the outside of the bar while putting away the groceries and preparing his ingredients.

\- Just don't gimme anythin' that looks like that crap we get inside.

Minion gave him a Look over his shoulder and rolled his eyes, easing back into himself.

\- Pff, _please_. Like I'd ever serve something like _that_. You will be dining on fresh baby-greens, flash-fried, sustainable tuna with my exclusive vinaigrette, everything topped with roasted sunflower seeds!

Cooking always calmed him down, and it worked it's magic now too.

Uncle Jugs just grinned back at him and leaned back in his chosen chair.

\- How 'fried' we talkin'? Not like that sorry piece o' salmon when he- what'd he call it? 'just addin' to the taste of an otherwise perfectly fine piece of fried piscine'? How much salt did he use?

\- About half a box I think. After two heaped tablespoons of lavender and rosemary. I still can't understand where he got fresh lavender from and he refuses to tell me!

Jugs couldn't stop the loud snort that image brought up; a six year old Blue proudly presenting a charred piece of salmon so salty it would give a Dead Sea fish kidney failure while reeking like a soap factory.

Minion grinned at the memory himself, remembering uncle Jugs's face when he took a bite of that horrible piece of fish. He had been extremely impressed their uncle managed to swallow it while keeping a straight face.

His uncle studied the counter surface, residues of a smile on his lips around a huge cigar.

The silence stretched, but it wasn't uncomfortable. They both knew they were avoiding certain topics, but Minion preferred to keep heavy subjects out of the kitchen.

So Minion made the food and Jugs leaned back and petted another brainbot that came in for attention, and they just existed.

\- Minion, have you seen-

Miss Ritchi stepped into the kitchen, dressed in a dark green, thin wool dress only Minion could appreciate the craftsmanship behind, and froze solid at the sight of uncle Jugs.

Only now did Minion realize he was sitting in Miss Ritchi's chair, and somehow this must be a Mistake if he was going to judge by her frozen stance, her face blank and just-

\- What's goi-

Uncle Jugs took one look over his shoulder at the new arrival and shot out of his- her?- seat before Minion had the chance to utter a word, sending it clattering to the floor, and pulled something dark and ugly out from the waist of his jeans, pointing it at Miss Ritchi.

He had rounded on her like a startled wolf, but his stance was devoid of anything resembling surprise.

\- The hell'r you doin'ere?!

Her brows snapped together at his caustic, ice cold tone and words.

Minion was astounded that she didn't bat an eye at having a Glock 45 pointed between her eyes, but- she was used to having death-traps aimed at her several times a month, so…

Miss Ritchi took a half-step to her right and grabbed a cast-iron frying pan from the wall, wielding it like a bat and stood her ground.

Minion flinched as Uncle Jugs flicked the safety off and his index finger came to rest on the trigger in one smooth move, letting Sir's favorite kidnapee stare straight into the barrel.

It all happened so fast! One second he was mixing the salad, the next he was scrambling to get between uncle Jugs and Ma'am before they killed each other!

\- STOP IT! Both of you!

Wide-eyed and glowing like a firefly on steroids he jumped between them, robotic arms out to either side in the universal stop-sign.

His heart beat a frantic rhythm in his small chest and his escas were twitching as if an electric current was running through them.

All he could think of was stopping the idiotic humans from killing each other, because _Sir will KILL me if I let anything happen to either of them!_

He did _not_ want to have to explain how uncle Jugs got his head smashed in by a frying pan! Or why Miss Ritchi has a hole in her head where there should not be one!

\- QUIT IT YOU TWO! I MEAN IT!

Uncle Jugs had lowered his gun as soon as Minion stepped into his line of fire, but Miss Ritchi was still poised to swing her improvised bat.

Whirling to her, Minion wrenched the heavy frying pan out of her grip, giving her his best 'I'm very disappointed in you'-glare as his crests pulsed pink in terrified outrage.

\- What the fuck is she-

-QUIET!

Minion rounded on his uncle, pointing at him with the frying pan, peering at him through narrow eyes over the rim of the pan and matching his hostile stance easily.

This was not happening!

 _This ends now!_

\- You! Sit down! Leave it, that's Miss Ritchi's chair. You go sit over there.

Minion pointed his uncle to the other end of the bar. Then he turned to the irate reporter who was still staring daggers at the other human in the room.

He extended his arm and righted the fallen chair for Miss Ritchi, placing it deliberately at the other end of the bar, far away from his uncle.

\- Now. We're gonna sit down. Like normal fucking adults! And we're gonna talk! Like civilized fucking people! Is that clear?!

He swiveled around in his bowl, looking each of them hard in the eyes. Uncle Jugs kept scowling at Miss Ritchi but didn't make a move, which counted as consent coming from him.

She glided into her chair, eyeing Jugs like a green panther stalking a prey.

A couple more seconds to make certain nobody was gonna jump across the counter to strangle someone Minion took his own spot between them.

Foregoing his reinforced chair he decided it would be best if he kept his position of power for the time being, standing between them, hands planted on the counter and looming.

\- Now, I believe there's been a misunderstanding h-

-Yeah, lil' missy'ere thinkin' she can go snoopin' 'round n' stickin' 'er nose where t'don't bel-

\- Oh fuck you, Jugosh!

Miss Ritchi slammed her hands down on the counter. Leaning over and glared at uncle Jugs.

\- That's right, I know who you are. And the misunderstanding is the fact that after he basically made me give a blood-oath, swearing me to silence and to not reveal anything, the warden can't keep his own mouth shut fo-

\- YOU LEAVE HIM OUTTA' THIS!

 _Evil gods give me strength..._

Minion opened his mouth to try and mediate the two clashing titans, but-

Everything happened at once;

Miss Ritchi shot up, her chair caught on the tile floor and toppled backwards again.

Her eyes burned with barely suppressed anger.

Uncle Jugs surged up like the demon he was.

His right hand went to his belt.

His left planted on the counter, fingertips going white.

Cold, pale blue-grey eyes stared down the reporter.

And Minion almost clouded his water.

Oh no, oh dear-

And then, suddenly, he'd had enough.

This was ridiculous!

\- I SAID SIT DOWN!

And slammed a fist into the counter top, cracking the stone slab down the middle.

The number of people who'd ever heard Minion truly roar doubled.

\- Or do I have to tie you to the chair, Miss Ritchi?

A dark chuckle coming from the other side had Minion spinning around in his suit like a striking cottonmouth.

\- You too, uncle, don't make me gag you!  
The choked sound devolving into a cough told Minion the message had been received.

Miss Ritchi, however stared at him with wide eyes, the ghost of a disbelieving smile tugging at the side of her mouth.

\- You wou-

\- Try me!

Enough with this crap!

\- The next one to talk I'll gag and tie to a chair before hanging it above the pit, is that clear?!

Evil gods, even his fins were tingling! What was it with these two?!

For a long moment nobody talked or made a move.

Miss Ritchi looked at him with a funny expression, arms crossed over her chest and back ramrod straight, while uncle Jugs leaned back in the chair, his cigar clamped between bared teeth.

\- All right. Uncle Jugs, I want you to meet Roxanne Ritchi, Sir's kidnapee. Miss Ritchi, this is uncle Jugs, aka Juggernaut, aka Jugosh Yevyeni. -but apparently you knew that already.

Without a word the two glared hellfire at each other in greeting, and Minion was surprised no-one burst into flames.

 _I guess that's the best I can hope for..._

\- Now, we're all here for the same reason, which means! You two are gonna have to handle being in the same room without trying to kill each other! Can you do that? Or do I have to make Spider-bot babysit you?

All he got from uncle Jugs was a dangerous growl sounding like consent, and Miss Ritchi huffily accepted the forced truce.

\- Oh, fine!

Minion didn't understand why she was so hostile towards his uncle in the first place. It was the warden who had spilled, but- well, as far as he knew female minions had been hard to understand. Female humans seemed impossible!

Besides, Minion was ecstatic that uncle Jugs was here to help! Between Miss Ritchi, uncle Jugs and himself they were bound to find Sir in no-time!

To keep the frail peace from collapsing, Minion turned back to his food preparations, trying to get a sense of normality back into the kitchen, but still casting glances at the two to make sure they behave.

He motioned 386 to refill his uncle's coffee mug and find some tea for Miss Ritchi.

He knew sharing a meal or a drink was instinctively calming and often bonding between humans so, you know, worth a try if nothing else...

Maybe lunch could help ease the tension still thick in the air.

Then they could get back to work!

* * *

 **Outside Metro City, day 1**

\- Six!

Doc twirled around to face Megamind with a huge grin, making him twitch at the sudden move, but then-

Not many things had the capability of leaving Megamind speechless, but this was one of them.

The Doc he knew from years ago had been gorgeous in human eyes. Scientifically handsome! Thick, shiny dark brown hair with a natural wavy thing going on, large oval eyes, an elegant, straight nose, chiseled chin, deep musical voice...

There was a reason everything at the facility with two X-chromosomes had fallen into his arms like flies drawn to a honey pot.

This Doc, however... was a husk!

Still dark-haired, but now it was matted and flat. His eyes were still large but had sunk, giving him a vague skeletal air, crows-feet and wrinkles reminding Megamind of those mummies sometimes found in the ice.

At some point he'd also broken his nose and it hadn't been set properly. The voice; rough like a smoker's yet still unpleasantly penetrating. Tall as ever, though, towering a good head-and-a-half above the alien, even if Megamind had been standing up.

But all that was secondary information that didn't really register through the red fog of hatred.

Megamind couldn't stop the feral growl rumbling in his throat from escaping.

He hated that name! Despised it. It wasn't even a name, it was a damn designation! Like he was just a thing. A thing to be used and then discarded when he no longer was of any value.

 _Oh but that's exactly what you are, isn't it?_

 _Shut up, I'm not listening to you anymore!_

\- So good to see you up and about!

Doc greeted him like they were old friends, a wide smile that looked warped and mad in the corners, sending a wave of goosebumps down Megamind's arms and spine.

Megamind knew he should be scared out of his magnificent mind, being back with Doc, but- he was just- numb. Like this was someone else. Like it wasn't him, Megamind, it was happening to. From his initial reaction, when he woke up in his cell, he would have thought he'd at least feel _something_! Anything! But he was just... hollow. Empty. Maybe that was for the best? He could freak out later, when Doc wasn't watching...

The silence stretched as Doc was staring at him with wide eyes, leaning forward with one hand planted on a knee to get face-to-face with the alien, as if waiting for a response.

Megamind took a whole three seconds before he could form an appropriately sarcastic comeback, rehearse it several times in his head and say it without gagging at the words.

\- Oh yes, it's wonderful seeing you too! What is it I can help you with this time? Adding? Dividing? How to shave? Sorry I don't get up to hug you but I'm all tied up at the moment.

It ate at him that he couldn't keep all of the resentment he felt towards the man from bleeding through into his voice, but he camouflaged it well with dripping sarcasm and a condescending grin.

\- Oh, nonono, no not this time. Well, yes, later, but not yet.

 _Oh... kay?_

\- Are you high?

Megamind couldn't _not_ ask.

Something was amiss with the scene playing in front of him. Doc _had_ to be high! That was not-

\- There are so many things we never got to do the last time we worked together! We never even got started on testing your mental capabilities!

Doc was bouncing around like a kid before Christmas, laughing as he talked and clapped his hands in an excited 'let's get started' kind of way.

Megamind's skin crawled at the way Doc said 'we'. Like he'd ever been a willing participant in that nightmare.

\- Of course, I still need to replicate all my work you destroyed last time, but- that's for... later... hm-

Doc trailed off as he got distracted by something on a table and started muttering under his breath instead.

Staring at something in one of many notebooks lying open he was switching between twirling a pencil in his fingers and biting the end of it.

It looked like Doc had forgotten Megamind was even there, muttering under his breath about bio-metrics, neural feedback, enzyme extraction, and scribbling something in an old, leather-bound book.

Not one to be ignored just like that, Megamind couldn't help but speak up.

He was itching for answers and the only way to get them was to get Doc's attention back on himself, even if that entailed the dangers of getting Doc's attention.

\- Sooooo... you kidnapped me to give me an IQ-test? What the hell is wrong with asking? Ever heard of email? I do have one, you know.

Even to Megamind his tone was a strange blend of incredulous condescension.

This was Doc.

There was no telling what he'd do if, or rather when, he snapped, but the man seemed oblivious to Megamind's tone, and he had a- vacant? No, a- feverish look in his too-glassy eyes.

A dangerous look.

Doc twirled around again with a flourish, his knee-length lab-coat flaring out behind him like a cape that had seen too many washes and turned stiff.

\- But I also have a few surprises for you, Six, if you behave that is.

\- Oh, great, I'll get a lollipop if I'm good? Seriously, did huffing up whippets with the Nitro make you forget? Bad has always been in my blood, Doc.

\- Hah! 'Bad, yes, I've watched the news. You really know how to make a show!

And then Doc _winked_ at him!

Megamind was going to make another jab, but all he managed was a strangled noise and a very shocked-looking, open-mouthed, wide-eyed grimace.

The reactions were... completely off.

Last time Doc had been a cold, calculating, clinical asshole of a man, driven by a thirst for knowledge and power.

The first time Megamind met doctor Neerim it had been like meeting a creature from another planet (which, technically, it was).

Doc had kept an emotional distance, but was smart enough to personally slam down on Megamind's convoluted and less convoluted jibes at his intelligence, escape attempts and his opinion of Doc's overall value in the human gene-pool.

Making a comment about Doc huffing anything should have sent him into an almost-uncontrollable rage! There was no way for a personality like that to make such a profound turn as what Megamind was looking at now.

It could be an act...

But then Doc would be- no, the subtle, unconscious body language humans didn't even realize they were using was- well, it was there, but it didn't match with the words. And yet it read as genuine... but so did his voice!

This man just- the man before him now was- It was impossible to read him!

Doc whirled around again, a big smile and a piece of paper in his hand.

\- Right! Let's get to work!

He skipped back over to Megamind and leaned in close enough for the alien to feel the breath ghost past his cheek, like Doc was about to tell a secret.

\- I need you to be completely honest with me now, Six, okay? Since I can't let you have any freedom quite yet I'm going to show you a test, and you have to tell me the second you've solved it. I'll be timing you and you just tell me, all right? It's not very accurate, I know, but it'll do for a simple preliminary test.

This was... creeping him out. The tone Doc was using, it-

 _Scars..._

Ugly scars from fire, running along the hairline, from above the right ear and down the neck, disappearing beneath a gray shirt under the lab-coat.

When Doc had turned Megamind remembered he could see they also covered all his neck and probably part-way down his back, it just hadn't registered until now. Other things had taken precedence.

The imagery made him cringe inwardly, thinking of how those scars came to be. Thinking of how sensitive his own neck was. How he'd react himself to-

A shiver of cold lightening ran down his back at the thought, making him squirm in his chair.

 _Did I do that?_

Did it matter?

 _Concentrate you idiot!_

Jerking back into the presence from the screeching voice in his head demanding he pay attention he focused his eyes back on Doc, still waiting for an answer.

\- Oh yes, of course I'll be honest.

Megamind gave him his sweetest, sardonic grin that held nothing even close sincerity, trying to lean a bit closer to the maniac.

\- It's not like I'm a supervillain or anything. Not like I lie and cheat every day. Obviously you can trust me!

\- Great!

 _...the hell...?_

\- You ready?

Megamind met the doctor's eager eyes with what was hopefully an unimpressed look, but it felt more like one of utter confusion.

What did Doc expect him to do? He'd said 'mental capabilities'. Was he just going to be used for his brain? Like an idea-machine chained to a chair?

It could be anything from creating weapons of mass destruction to solving the unified field theory (which he'd already done but he wasn't telling Doc that!).

He was shown a Sudoku game.

 _Sudoku, digit-single. A logic-based, combinatorial number-placement puzzle where the objective is to fill a 9×9 grid with digits so that each column, each row, and each of the nine 3×3 subgrids that compose the grid contains all of the digits from 1 to 9_ his mind supplied unnecessary.

\- Oh for Einstein's sake- you weren't kidding?! What the fuck is wrong with you?!

Doc just chuckled and showed his teeth in what must have been an attempt to smile.

At least it was one of the hardest Sudoku games ever created, so that was something.

Megamind recognized it as the work of Arto Inkala, the Finnish mathematician.

Sudoku was rated with stars, one star was easy and five was considered the 'expert' level.

Inkala's game had scored an eleven.

Megamind guessed it would be considered cheating by not telling Doc he'd been consulting Inkala during it's creation, but... like hell he was, he was going to screw with Doc every chance he got!

 _Let the games begin..._

Megamind almost laughed out loud at that wonderful pun, but got himself under control and focused instead on the man before him.

With an exaggerated, drawn out sigh even that apathetic, dusty curator for the new library- Barney wasn't it? -would be proud of, he spared a 0.82 second long glance at the paper, looked back up at Doc through his eyelashes with an exasperated 'this is it?' look, raising a brow for emphasis.

\- Is this really the best you can do?

He rolled his eyes and spit the last words at the doctor with a disgusted expression.

\- It's not even a challenge!

\- Wha- you solved it already? But- you said you'd be honest! You barely even looked at it! You-

Yes, Megamind had used shorter time that he theoretically should have, since he'd worked with the creator and knew some of the math gone into it, but it wouldn't have taken more than 0.12 seconds extra even if he'd never seen it before.

Besides, he wasn't going to give Doc any more correct results than necessary!

Doc was standing over him, gesticulating wildly, pointing at the sheet of paper, looking at Megamind, looking back at the puzzle with a frown and several times a shadow that had nothing to do with any kind of light-source flashed across his eyes.

Megamind, outwardly calm, observed Doc's rant with laughing eyes and a positively evil grin while his insides was twisting itself into knots at his idiocy and his instincts were screaming at him to Stop Antagonizing The Mad Man!

But he was determined to let himself enjoy the show for a few seconds and screw the consequences, all the while in the back of his mind he continued cataloging the different equipment around the room he could use.

 _Cannibalize centrifuge for radio parts._

 _Objectives from the microscope should make good barrels for compact de-gun, plus wiring._

 _Is that potassium powder? Very reactive..._

 _Oh, laser-pointer in his chest pocket!_

 _Scalpels and knives are always useful..._

A reflection from Doc caught his attention.

Something small on the inside edge of his lab coat. Was that- Oh! A pin! Looking like one of those dry-cleaner-pins used to attach the receipt, and Doc had missed it. It was to the inside edge at the perfect height to get his hands on it, if he could just get close enough...

A pin wasn't much, but it was a start.

Megamind could do things with a pin.

All he needed was a way to get loose, then he would get out of here, get home, assemble an army of brainbots with Minion and then he would _demolish_ both this place and Doc!

When it seemed Doc was finishing his rant at Megamind's lack of cooperation, he switched his focus back to the human, pretending he wasn't planning aaaaaanything *look innocent now*.

Doc looked a bit lost as to what to do next. The silence in the chilly room was roaring at them and Megamind finally decided to break it by purring a sing-songy explanation at him.

\- I told you... Eeeeevil...

And grinned like the cat who got the canary when the doctor completely lost the ability to produce sounds.

Or breathe.

Doc's left eye twitched, a vein started throbbing on the right side of his head just above the temple and as impossible it had seemed he turned even whiter!

 _Huh. Never seen that one before…_

No matter, he was going to mess with Doc's head, tests and whatever else he could until either he found a way out of here, Minion came to get him or Doc got tired of him and just put him down like any other animal.

Megamind was only getting started and refused to acknowledge the tinny, increasingly frantic voice in the back of his head screaming at him to Pay Attention, Look at the man, See him!

(He really should have)

Somewhere in the far back of Megamind's mind his subconscious realized that this guy was truly dangerous. Dangerous on a deeper level than Megamind had ever known before. A new level of evil Megamind never wanted to touch with a thirty-foot pole!

Doc let out a frustrated yell and crunched the paper into a ball, throwing it into a corner.

It bounced off a table leg and rolled part-way back to Doc out of spite, stopped by a fold in the plastic sheet on the floor.

\- This isn't how it was supposed to be!

Surprised by his outburst Megamind carefully observed as Doc stalked back and forth across the room that somehow felt smaller than just a few seconds ago.

\- You were supposed to- to cooperate!

Doc's voice was trembling with infuriated passion.

\- We're meant be working together! You know you want to! You- you said I could trust you! I- You- you have to do this! You can't just-

Doc's breathing was picking up speed, he was loosing what little color remained in his face-

He fell back into ramblings, walking in tight circles, hands clenching and unclenching and several times Megamind though he'd rip his hair but Doc stopped short every time and lowered his trembling arms again.

After several minutes he slowed down until he stood, white-faced and shaking, staring off into the distance.

Then, with sleepy steps he walked past Megamind without so much as a glance at his captive, Megamind heard the sound of a drawer opening and Doc starting rummaging through them.

He stayed there, behind Megamind's back, for a long time, at an angle Megamind couldn't quite turn his head to see and his nerves started singing very off-key.

A cold draft kissed his shoulder.

The smell of disinfectant got more pronounced.

 _Wait, disinfectant?_

Something in the room changed.

TBC


End file.
